


A Matter of Politics

by MaevesChild



Series: Borders Yet to Be [4]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Asunder - Fandom, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Casual Sex, F/M, Grey Warden Bullshit, Hurt/Comfort, Or at least that's what they said it was, Politics, Romance, Sexual Content, Spoilers, and more spoilers, and spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-15
Updated: 2015-03-07
Packaged: 2018-01-15 19:52:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 30,995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1317220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaevesChild/pseuds/MaevesChild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He was supposed to be dead; several people wished she was. This wasn't supposed to happen, but sometimes, it is inevitable for war to break out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Plays the Thing

Being First Enchanter had sounded like an excellent idea, until it actually happened. And of course, technically she was only an apostate now and she was First Enchanter of nothing. That didn't mean she didn't cling to the title a bit, even so. Despite Adrian's protests, Fiona felt she should be more protected, not take a chance of being caught out in the open. They'd lost so many already and they didn't want to lose more, especially not someone Fiona felt could be more effective at negotiations than fighting. It was a ridiculous notion, but Fiona said tact had failed them. They needed representatives that were fiery and strong and passionate and Adrian couldn't deny that she was all those things. That didn't mean she wouldn't preferred to have fought with her fellow mages. They were out there dying and she was here unable to truly help.

Adrian disagreed vocally and venomously, but all to no avail. She was _born_ to fight and for the first time in her life she was free to actually fight for what she believed in. It was the time and the place she had simply been  _born_  to live in, but instead of fighting they wanted her to play political games and hide far from the front lines _._  It had driven her mad, but even she had a threshold for arguing, though Rhys would probably have disagreed.

Not that he was speaking to her, despite Fiona sending him to Montsimmard as well where he and Evangeline were trying to figure out a way to counter Templar skills. He might have been in the same building, but he might as well have been a million miles away. He wasn't likely to speak to her ever again.

It still stung a little. She couldn't say she loved him - Adrian wasn't entirely sure she'd experienced enough actual love in her life to even identify the emotion. The only clear recollection she had of the feeling was her mother. She had a father, of course, but she couldn't even conjure up an image of his face. She remembered her mother trying to tame her unruly hair into braids, she remembered warm blankets and off key singing. She remembered her mother loved her, at least until she accidentally set fire to the barn.

That was a fragile, conditional love. Yet it was supposed to be the most powerful. Adrian had seen it first hand when Wynne sacrificed herself to save that Templar Rhys had fallen for. Adrian's own mother was not nearly so committed. But that was a good lesson to learn in the end. It was better to be strong than let love sway you to do crazy things.

Love didn't mesh well with being a mage anyway.

Either way, Adrian didn't love Rhys, but he had been her friend for more than a decade and he'd been a passable enough lover back in the day. Now he despised her for ending the life of that Tranquil. Well, not that as much, since he knew as well as she did the man deliberately wanted an end, but more for the desperate action she took to force Wynne's hand. Adrian did not regret what she had done. It had to be done or they all be locked up in the tower, if not Tranquil, by now. And she would likely have to sacrifice far more than just an old friendship to set the mages free from the yoke of the Chantry.

She often wished she could meet the apostate who blew up the Chantry in Kirkwall. He was a man after her own defective little heart.

So here she was, in Montsimmard where the mages still had their tower and with even the most minimal support of the Empress, they had some manner of protection from the conflict. It was somewhere Adrian could make plans and more importantly (or so the Fiona seemed to think) try to court the Grey Wardens to the mage cause. They were the strongest fighting force in Thedas after the Templars and despite claiming to stay out of anything that didn't involve darkspawn...well, everyone knew that was a lie. The Grey Wardens had been tied up in everything politic since they began during the first Blight.

Montsimmard was beautiful and remote, perched on the edge of a lake that seemed as big as the sea with forest and rolling fields and all the other beautiful pastoral things one saw in paintings of Orlais. It was one of the few Circles not totally emptied by the conflict due to the iron fist of their First Enchanter whom they appropriately called Madame du Fer. And since she was conveniently in the capital, Adrian found it possible to make herself at home for the time being. Even better, it didn't stink of fish and fear like the city did and for that she was thankful. It also had a significant lack of Templars and Seekers, at least for the moment and that was even better. All in all, it was hardly a terrible place to be stuck, despite her overwhelming urge to blow things up.

And then, there was  _him._ That had been the most surprising...surprise of them all.

Adrian hadn't recognized his face when she first saw him, though that was hardly surprising. There was this unmistakable aura about him that let her know he was important, even more than his Grey Warden colors did. He wasn't in a position of leadership or she assumed she would have met him by now, but he had the bearing of a man used to leading. She found him immediately interesting - no matter what else she found appealing, strength and leadership were the ultimate aphrodisiac for Adrian. Rhys's significant lack of backbone and drive had been the nail in that particular coffin after all.

Certainly, it didn't hurt that he was tall with piercing eyes and dark hair and he was typically attired in well worn Grey Warden armor that had seen its share of battle. Most in the tavern opted for more comfortable clothes, but he seemed at home in his armor. Everything about him was simple and strong and reminded her of something out of a storybook.

He didn't speak much and kept to himself. She watched him for several nights in the common room of the tavern near the Warden compound before she heard him say a single word. Even then, it was just to grouse that his drink of choice was currently unavailable. He'd requested some specific honey mead, something about Bannorn clover honey or some such that sounded foreign. His accent was clearly not Orlesian either, but she couldn't quite place it. Then again, Adrian had never been outside of Orlais, so her skill there was lacking.

She caught him watching her on the fourth night. She was frustrated by that point, having spent another day being given a thousand and one excuses why the Warden Commander couldn't see her again. She had more to drink than she should have and when an even more inebriated Warden bumped her table and knocked over the candle, she didn't even think about it before she righted it again and lit the wick with her magic.

First Enchanter or no, it wasn't a good idea to go around advertising her magic. She wanted to be free, but she wasn't stupid. She knew many feared magic - it was why she'd forgone her enchanter's robes for something nondescript when she visited the tavern, especially since she used it as an excuse to get away from her three fellow mage chaperones. First Enchanter yes, but entirely trusted to keep her temper on her own? Not so much.

Adrian caught him looking at her when the little flame danced from her fingertips. But he didn't seem frightened or even the least bit concerned. He also didn't look intrigued which was the other common reaction to a display of magic. Instead he looked oddly wistful, like he'd just seen something that reminded him of home. He discovered her catch him looking and he didn't bother to look embarrassed. He nodded at her in greeting, downed his tankard and left.

She was immediately even more intrigued. Who was this man that had neither fear nor interest in her magic? Who was he that looked like a general but drank mead alone like a commoner? Why did he look so lonely?

When she heard his name, it explained most of that away, though she definitely still had questions.

_Loghain Mac Tir._

Maker's Breath. Everyone in Orlais, even mages, knew who he was. Libertarian mages like Adrian often had a special fondness for him and she was certainly no exception. The Chantry was all tied up with the nobility in Orlais and often seemed like one in the same, so anyone who knocked one or the other down a peg was a hero in her book.

Adrian was no romantic, certainly, but the stories of Loghain Mac Tir and Maric Theirin were legendary. There were even new stories of how Loghain had been redeemed from the death of King Cailan and helped to end the Blight, then came to Orlais the heroic Warden. Some of the stories said he and the Hero of Ferelden were lovers, but in those stories he was usually dead, so she never gave them much credence.

It was as if a dashing knight in shining (tarnished and slight dented) armor walked out of the pages of a book. When he'd walked out that door, she somewhat expected she wouldn't see him again. Once she realized who he was, well, characters from stories rarely show up at your front door.

Of course, she was wrong.

The next morning, he was waiting for her outside the tower. She came outside in her black and green First Enchanter robes, expecting to see the same set of Grey Wardens that had accompanied her to the compound every morning, despite never getting to see anyone of importance. Instead, it was Loghain Mac Tir waiting for her.

"Good morning Warden," she said, wondering if she hid her surprise as well as she hoped.

"Enchanter...Adrian, it is?" he asked.

She liked the way he said her name. His Fereldan accent was exotic and his voice was deep and gravelly.

"Yes, though you aren't my usual...escort," she said. She was pleased to see him, but that didn't stop her from being annoyed by the constant watching. She pursed her lips. "One would think the Wardens would be less suspicious of mages."

"Warden mages, perhaps, though the current conflict being what it is," he shrugged and his armor creaked a little, "You can hardly blame them. That is not why I am here, however. I am here to tell you to not waste your time, today at least. I would not bother yourself for a month or more. Warden Constable Bernard sent word to Weisshaupt. He will not meet with you until then."

"Where's Warden Commander Clarel? I was to speak with her," Adrian asked. Her brow furrowed.

Loghain frowned and looked a bit as if he'd tasted something bitter. "She's been... _away_ for some time. Along with many of the others. There's only a few of us left here and the Warden Constable was left in charge. I don't know that anyone planned to let you in on that bit of information. That Wardens are...," he paused as if he was debating how to continue. "We are having internal issues at the moment."

"Why are you telling me this?" Adrian was honestly surprised. It was more open than anyone else had been, though she'd already worked out that something was amiss on her own. "None of your fellows seemed inclined to tell me anything."

Loghain gave her an expression that might almost have been a smile, though it reached nowhere near his eyes. "I have seen what happens when politicians make mages wait. And here in Montsimmard, that is what the Constable is, just a politician. He's hardly a warrior and no hero." He grunted in obvious disgust. "But whatever he is, he's also too stupid to know leaving a mage pacing outside his door every day is a bad idea."

Adrian laughed.

"Do you think I'll get frustrated and shoot a fireball at the door, Monsieur?" She clucked at him. "Do you think I am so foolish?"

"No, not foolish," he said perfunctorily. "Just with a mage's temperament. And a woman's. I've known both well enough."

"But you do not know me," she cocked her head at him and considered. He didn't seem the type to be turned away by a bit of flirting. Adrian was lonely. She rarely indulged herself in anything beyond flirting - men became too attached and it was too awkward in the tower where one could never get away but that didn't mean she didn't enjoy the flirting, the wordplay,  _the chase._ And he was just standing there, flouting the rules as if he hadn't a care in the world. It was immeasurably arousing. "Though I would not mind if you did,  _know me_ , that is. It does seem I will have much time to wait, after all."

"Are you propositioning me?" He wasn't embarrassed, but did seem a bit taken aback by her bluntness.

"I didn't expect to get your armor off quite so swiftly, if that's what you mean," she grinned at him, not bothering to be coy. Despite her intoxication by powerful men, she only knew of them by reputation and in stories. She was flying on instinct, but she knew she wanted nothing more than to get and keep his attention. "But I know no one but my assistants and they are driving me to...what did you say...express my mage's temperament? I could use something to distract me."

He looked at her out of the corner of his eye.

"I'm hardly the best company for conversation," he said. "But I," he paused and shook his head. "Am I actually considering this?" He said it as if he was thinking aloud. "I am clearly a madman."

"Good," Adrian laughed. "That  _will_  be distracting."

* * *

Loghain reminded himself that he was dead, so whatever ridiculous thing he did to entertain himself didn't really matter.

When he left the mage at her tower with the promise to meet her for the evening meal, he was feeling an interesting melange of emotions ranging from anxiety and arousal mixed with a significant amount of guilt.

Thinking in Orlesian words like  _melange_  wasn't helping either. He'd been in this Maker forsaken place for entirely too long. And the worst part was that sometimes he was even beginning to like it.

He liked the food. He couldn't really articulate how much that vexed him.

This little mage, she  _was_  a brash one, and he couldn't deny that he liked that in a woman. There was something about a woman who wasn't afraid of what she believed in, even if that thing was finding a way to seduce him. During his long years of celibacy, between Maeve's death and meeting Kya (ignoring the ritual with the swamp witch, of course, which he always did since he liked to be able to sleep at night) he had moments of wishing for a woman like that to appear in his life. Like Cauthrien yet she was only bold on the battlefield and so timid everywhere else, at least when it came to him. Now that his old life was far away, he allowed himself more moments of idle speculation.

Loghain had more regrets than he had once realized, though dying wasn't one of them.

It wasn't that he didn't desire things to be different. He couldn't fool himself that much. There were nights that there was a burning in his chest so visceral he thought for certain he was dying. It wasn't a lie, the letter he sent to Kya.

_The Deep Roads are calling, and as much as I have fought it, it is to no avail._

The nightmares and the pain of being apart from her were killing him. He wrote each word in agony, fingers stained with ink, hands shaking with the effort. The dreams were horror; a bloated  _thing_  that stalked him, screamed vulgarity at him, threatened him by name. Sometimes, he saw it even when he was awake. His fingers were numb all the time.

There were Wardens going on their Calling, heading to Orzammar once their goodbyes were done. He planned to meet his end with them.

But then suddenly, the nightmares were gone. It was like the sun broke through the clouds or some other terrible metaphor he was useless to come up with. Whatever best described it, it was over. The hallucinations ended.

Instead of leaving for Orzammar with the latest group of Wardens, they gave him recruits to train in sword and shield and in archery from cover, all well within his area of expertise. He thanked the Maker for the distraction and worked himself and his recruits so hard it was surprising he didn't kill them. But no matter how hard he pushed himself, there was still this persistent energy in him. Despite fighting against it, he penned and then burned a new letter to Kya Amell every night.

It was like drowning. He struggled to breathe at times.

He wrote one final letter and bared his soul to her in it. He explained that somehow his Calling had faded and he'd been given yet one more chance to live and be alive,  _and by Andraste please come to Orlais_. It was unbelievably selfish, but he'd missed out on a  _life_  already and if there was still a chance...

He asked her to marry him but left the letter unsent on his desk, waiting. He didn't know what he was waiting for until it happened.

Eventually, official word came from Ferelden that Warden Commander Amell had dispatched a sentient broodmother. One of those talking darkspawn she told him about, and although he'd never had the misfortune of seeing one in person, he heard Kya's tales of the broodmother they dispatched in the Deep Rods outside Caridin's Cross. It explained his nightmares and their secession.

Unofficial word trailed along with it, as it always did. What he'd insinuated, what he'd pushed them into,  _what he'd wanted when he wasn't being a selfish old prick_  had happened...after he  _died._  Warden Commander Amell moved the Howe boy into her rooms in the Vigil and it was almost scandalous that way they were carrying on.

_They went to Gwaren together and put up a memorial for Loghain Mac Tir and wasn't that funny?_

Hysterical even.

He burned the letter.

That was almost a decade ago, but if he thought about it too much, it was still raw, like poking the socket of a lost tooth. He hated that it bothered him. He went to Montsimmard with a clearer heart and purpose than he'd had in many years. He was happy to see the little light that flickered in Nathaniel Howe's eyes when he said Kya's name.

But when he left Ferelden, he thought he was dying. Any man can be alone for a time and be selfless, especially when that time is so perfectly limited by death in battle on the other side.

Now? Now the Blight was over, and though there was certainly war, technically it was a war that didn't concern the Grey Wardens - some lordling trying to take the throne, and mages trying to blaze their way to being free and rogue Templars chasing at their heels. Once, he would have not had a second thought siding with the Templars. Loghain was not a devout man by any means, but he was just a man who's first taste of magic was almost dying at the hand of a Witch of the Wilds.

But things change. Mages, it turned out, were just people, much as Grey Wardens were. Some were decent and some were assholes. And the uncontrolled force of the Templars without the tempering of the Chantry mothers behind them was frightening indeed. It was like a sword wielded by a madman. The sword wasn't evil, but evil was being done with it. Granted, the mages had some things to answer for certainly, but all the colors in the world were now grey.

It was easier when the world was black and white.

That  _was_  where war came into play. There was your comrades and your enemies. It didn't matter in the soldiers in the other uniforms were decent men that loved their mothers. All that mattered is they opposed you and you need to end them. Loghain knew the drumbeat of war, and it was a dance he preferred if he could have it. Though the Wardens had more than enough problems of their own right now, so many of them suddenly struggling with nightmares and hallucinations, but if anyone asked his opinion, he would tell them to side with the mages. No one deserved to be locked away for an accident of birth. He knew that blood and the name you were born with didn't have to define you. Everything about Loghain was not what he'd been born to. Besides, Wardens were supposed to protect the people and he didn't see why that only meant from darkspawn.

It didn't have anything to do with the little curly haired mage he'd pegged as the rebel mage representative the first time she sauntered into the tavern, all red hair and bravado. Of course not. That would be absurd.

He was  _sixty_ , by the Maker. He should grow a beard and tell stories about past battles and make jokes about his lack of libido. That was what old men did, after all.

This damned Grey Warden business was not letting things progress  _naturally_ , as it were. He was blasted  _sixty_  and he'd been celibate for more of his life...Maker, longer than he'd ever had a lover, despite being married for fifteen years. And here he was, with a Grey Warden appetite that was most certainly not going to be contented or sated with food.

For the past eight years, he'd visited more brothels than he had the entire rest of his life combined, but that was empty and afterward he often wished he's stayed in his quarters and taken care of it himself. Until the next time, and then the next. It seemed immeasurably more wise than getting involved with someone again. Despite knowing Kya was likely Kya  _Howe_  by now, it almost felt like betrayal.

Then again, the opportunity hadn't ever just dropped in his lap before. And wasn't Kya the one who taught him that regrets were the one thing you couldn't change? Didn't she tell him not to waste the life he still had in worrying about what came before?

Maybe this wasn't what she had in mind, but he  _was_  dead. Might as well live it up.


	2. The Seduction

Adrian wasn't sure what she expected from an evening with a legendary figure, but she hadn't expected it to be so... comfortable. Not that she had the opportunity to spend much time being courted, it didn't feel all that different from nights spent chatting with Rhys. It was a little awkward at first, but she'd seen to that herself with her earlier forward behavior.

She found herself apologizing for it before he stopped her. She was glad he stopped her, just for the sake of honesty; she really wasn't very sorry. Not that she was a paragon of truthfulness, but she would be a bald faced liar to say she didn't want him, just sitting there across the table being devastatingly masculine. The Warden blue tunic he'd chosen instead of his usual armor made her want to stare at his eyes and the streaks of silver that threaded though his shoulder length black hair. Hair like that just begged to be touched.

She knew he was quite a bit older than she; she didn't even remember the end of the occupation of Ferelden. She did remember hearing stories about it as she grew up, especially once she came to the White Spire and there was more time for stories in the dark of the dormitories. Loghain was a man when he became the Hero of River Dane, a young man certainly, but still a man.

But Loghain was aging well. He showed his years in the lines around his eyes and a particular gauntness to his cheeks, but it didn't diminish him. She found the planes and valleys of his face fascinating. She had heard Grey Wardens usually died young, but perhaps that was just a tale?

His reticent manner made her feel more at ease than she expected it would. She found herself relaying the tale of her adventure with Rhys and Wynne, of course leaving out some of the more specific details. She didn't want this to end before it had even started. She wasn't sorry for what she'd done, but she knew it wasn't exactly a polite conversation topic. Interestingly, it never really occurred to her that he would have known Wynne, despite knowing they both were connected to the Hero of Ferelden.

Adrian had been enraptured by the entire idea that Wynne had known the Hero,  _The Warden_ ; it was odd that her mind had separated Loghain from the same story. She'd gone all misty talking with Wynne about it. Of course. she'd been far more into her cups that night than this one. Maybe it was by design, or maybe it was only that she knew Loghain's part in the tale through half truths and rumors. It would be good to know the real story. A mage saving Thedas from the Blight might be a good banner to fly in the face of the Warden Commander.

"Enchanter Wynne," Loghain didn't sound entirely pleased at the feel of her name in his mouth. "We did not see eye to eye, though in the end she stopped glaring at me and certainly did an admirable job at healing us after the destruction of the Archdemon. She will be missed for her skills at healing, if not for her sharp tongue."

Adrian felt entirely out of her depth, despite her mind trying to find a way to use this to her advantage in her eventual political machinations.  _The Archdemon._ Loghain had seen things that made her own adventure look like a vacation to the seashore.

"What was it like? And what was she like, the Hero of Ferelden?" she couldn't help but ask but immediately regretted it when she saw the almost imperceptible twitch in Loghain's jaw.  _Maybe that was a sore spot?_

"The Hero of Ferelden," he repeated, his voice just a shade more than a sigh. "She was,  _is_ , a rare woman though I have not seen her in many years. I have never known anyone quite like her." The expression on his face made Adrian rethink which of the tales she'd heard was the truth.

"I...maybe I shouldn't ask," she said, knowing she was going to ask anyway. "But I have heard tales where she was your lover. I can't help but wonder if that is true."

Loghain raised an eyebrow at her. "I didn't expect you'd be interested in hearing about previous...entanglements. Women rarely do."

"Well, I'm not like that," she admitted. "Besides, I don't see why any of this has to be so complicated. We are both adults and we both have larger goals. I've made the mistake of...letting feelings get in the way of my goals before and I don't intend on doing that again. You don't have to hide anything in an attempt to protect me."

Maker, that sounded cold. But Rhys had taught her more than one thing about feelings. He taught her she had no idea what love was and even more importantly that she had no desire to find out. This man was intriguing; she was enjoying his company, the sound of his voice, even the way he smelled like leather and oil and steel, so there was no harm in his company. As long as she remembered to protect herself, that was.

Loghain looked unconvinced. "I'm hardly a man to go spout off about such things and to be frank my dear, I don't know that I can trust you just yet."

"Fair enough." She couldn't fault that logic. "Another time perhaps, when I've earned your trust?"

"I assume that means you intend for a repeat of tonight's performance?" he asked as if he was unsure, or maybe if he was testing her. Adrian wasn't sure what to make of it.

"I didn't know the play was over," she said, a jeu de mots that she found so enjoyable. "I was hoping there was a second act."

He raised his eyebrow again. She liked that expression and hoped she could get him to repeat it. "I have nowhere else to be, though perhaps we can choose a more...benign subject to discuss. Like  _darkspawn_  or your war."

" _My_  war?" she laughed. "I suppose it is in a way, though I must also confess I don't trust you well enough to explain my part in its inception." How would you tell someone how you euthanized a man and framed someone else for the deed...and still manage to bed him? Adrian was fairly certain it wasn't possible.

"Then we are even," he said. "And I find that agreeable." Loghain quickly downed the dregs of his wine, gesturing at her to do the same. She followed suit without even thinking about it. He seemed the type of man used to being followed, and until recently, Adrian was used to following. It was probably a habit she should break.

"So maybe instead of taking the chance at more inappropriate conversation," he continued. "We should do an  _appropriate_  activity instead. Perhaps a walk in the warmth of the evening?"

Adrian tittered. "How fitting," she said. "The gallant knight and the moonlight. I might just swoon."

She hoped sarcasm wouldn't turn him off.

It didn't.

Instead, he stood and offered her his arm. "My lady?"

"My Lord...wait," she paused. "In Ferelden, you were a Teyrn, that is what it is called, yes?"

He nodded, "Yes, but I am no longer a nobleman, if that's what you are asking."

"No, no," she waved his denial away. "Don't ruin my moment." She smiled and curtsied. "Your...Grace? That is the right term?"

Loghain shook his head, but indulged her. "Yes, it is, though I haven't heard it in years."

"It is a nice title," she said, wrapping her fingers around his arm as he lead her towards the door. "You are actually very graceful, for such a big man. It suits you."

He looked down at her and seemed both puzzled and pleased at her compliment. He nodded at her, a common gesture for him, though this one was tempered by an amused half smile.

"Thank you, my lady," he said in a mockery of the most formal of speech. "You are too kind."

* * *

The streets of Montsimmard were like any other in Orlais, if a bit cleaner and more well kept than the average. The presence of the mages and Wardens did much to keep the streets safe at night. So instead of thugs and other rabble, the streets were quiet. It was later, far later than he'd realized with the moon high up in the sky casting a pale pallor over the buildings. There were a few oil lamps that lined the streets, but not so many that it chased away the shadows.

Loghain was surprised he'd spent as much time with Adrian as he had. He had expected to talk himself out of this by now. Not that she was unpleasant company, but if he was to be honest with himself, he primarily agreed to their meeting with entirely impure motivations. She was a lovely and curvaceous little thing who gave the impression she would be enthusiastic about everything she applied herself to. He was rather thinking she might apply herself to him, and put a dent in this unbelievably distracting Grey Warden appetite of his.

It bothered him that he was considering using her like that, but she seemed so matter of fact about the idea, no more emotionally involved than any whore... _Maker_ , that was not helping matters any. She wasn't a whore, she was a First Enchanter of the Circle of Magi. She was...she was at the very least not here to take his coin and amuse him at his request.

Adrian seemed to notice his internal turmoil or at least his extended silence. She gripped his arm a little tighter and looked up at him as they turned a corner and slipped into a narrow passage between two buildings.

"Are you well?" she asked. Her voice had the softest lilt to it, a less pronounced accent than many in Orlais. It didn't bother him; in fact he found he actually enjoyed listening to her speak. It was a good thing, she had a lot to say.

"Yes," he overcame his discomfort and managed to look at her for a moment. He realized he didn't know what color her eyes were and couldn't tell in wan moonlight with only the distant flicker of the lamp on the corner behind them. "Though I'm afraid I am not as good company as I had intended."

"I think," she said, not missing a beat, "For all that I do not know you yet, I think that you think too much."

Loghain snorted. "That would be an accurate assessment. I am not particularly good...," he waved his hand, gesturing at nothing. "...at this sort of thing."

"At which?" she said, her mouth twisting a little. It made the faint shadow of a dimple appear next to her mouth. "I did not intend for this to be anything that required too much thinking." She stopped and slid her arm out from under his, leaning herself against a stack of crates under the eves of the building. Loghain stopped as well, turning back to look at her. Her face was shadowed, as was his own.

"If I have offended you in some way," she continued. She looked like she was going to say something further but shook her head instead. "I'm not particularly known for my tact. I just thought...well, never mind what I thought."

He shook his own head in reply, feeling a different soft of guilt. She was blaming herself for his reluctance, and it wasn't fair. He didn't plan on insulting her.

"No, no," he said quickly. "You have most certainly not offended me. You have been nothing but kind. I am just unaccustomed to..."

"To being seduced?" He couldn't tell if she was smiling, but her tone made it sound as if she was. "I find that hard to believe. A handsome man like you, with such a dashing life story? It seems unlikely you spend any time alone you do not wish to."

Loghain couldn't help but laugh at that.

"Perhaps that would be true if I was a more...approachable person. But I have cultivated my reputation of being difficult and unpleasant so carefully I am rarely bothered." It was true, truer than he was used to admitting to. The shadows always made him willing to say things he would normally not say. "And I am indeed difficult and opinionated, so it is a good deal like the truth, though even I must admit I am less of a bear than I let on."

 _The Deep Roads, the wood between Denerim and Amaranthine_  . It was becoming a habit, speaking to beautiful women in the dark where he couldn't quite see them. Not that this was anything like those moments. Those were moments of consummating feelings he'd hidden for a long time. This was something far less complicated, yet here he was persisting on making it more difficult than it had to be.

"Why don't you want anyone to know you?" she asked him. It was a direct and honest question and one he wasn't entirely sure he had an answer for.

Instead of thinking too deeply about it, he shrugged. "It is just my way, I suppose. Maric was the charming one; I was ... I don't even know the right term, though I'm sure there are several pejoratives that would fit."

"You are very hard on yourself," she said as she boosted herself up to sit on the edge of the crate. "It seems so unnecessary." She paused thoughtfully for a moment, listening to the sound of a woman laughing somewhere down the street. It was followed by the punctuation of a door slamming shut and the laughter disappeared. "Let me ask you, Monsieur. Let me just come out and ask it," she said. "Do you find me attractive?"

"I may be old, but I have not gone blind," he said, maybe a little too quickly. "You are a uniquely beautiful woman. Any man who did not see that would be blind indeed." He elaborated more than usual, but why not say what he was thinking? How many times had he not told Rowan she was beautiful when she could have used to hear it?

"Not so old," she replied. "You really do not realize you are handsome, do you?" She laughed with a little sadness mixed in. "Perhaps it makes you more handsome to not know. Whether that is so or not,  _I_ find you quite handsome and I see no reason we should not indulge in a little pleasure amidst all the frustrations of our current situations." She held out her hand to him.

It was an offer, a simple offer of companionship that he was in dire need of. There was no denying he was attracted to her. There was something about her presence that appealed to him and thankfully nothing she'd said or done had done anything to dim that. Perhaps her stories and less than subtle innuendo only served enhance it a bit. She was not open, and Loghain was a good enough judge of character to detect that she was less than honest when it suited her. But that was...something that did not for a moment remind him of the women he'd spent so much time trying to forget.

There were parallels, but they were superficial. He still wrestled with this conscience, looking at her proffered hand and debating with himself. He'd never truly enjoyed a woman without his heart or his honor being all tied up in it before.

Loghain looked at Adrian. He could only see her outline and the glint of blue moonlight on her curls. She held her hand out still, like a lifeline for a moment of simple pleasure, and he'd had entirely too few pleasures, hadn't he?

He took her hand and let her pull him close. She reached up with her other hand and brushed it against the stubble on his cheek. It sent a shock of pleasure through him and he shivered.

"You don't let people touch you often, do you?" she asked, laying the palm of her hand against his face, the tips of her fingers behind the ridge of his jaw.

"No, I don't." It was merely a fact and one that didn't usually bother him except his body was reminding him vividly of all the places he'd like her to touch him instead.

"Let me remedy that." She pulled him forward and before he had another chance to think better of it, he let her kiss him. Her lips were soft and she tasted of wine and smelled faintly of vanilla and amber. His body reacted, his hand pressing into the small of her back and sliding her forward on the crate until it was only the pressure of his hand holding her up even with him.

He felt her teeth as she nipped at his lower lip, a breathy moan escaping from her.

"Mmm," her voice was a throaty purr. "Loghain."

He could only growl in reply, his need for this stealing his ability to respond. He ground himself against her, the edge of his hands scraping against the wood crate and they slid from her waist to the curve of her ass. She was too short, so he lifted her and her arms twined around his neck.

"I should," he finally panted against her neck, "I should just take you right here in this alley."

Adrian was breathless to reply and instead just squirmed against him.

"But it is too dark," he said, though he just rubbed himself against her again instead of stepping back. "I want to see you. I don't want to miss anything."

He saw the flash of her teeth as she smiled and her head fell back, giving him more access to the soft skin on her throat.

"I would enjoy that," she said as if she was having trouble finding enough air. "I have a feeling I will enjoy  _you_ however you choose to have me."

He laughed. Her brazen words, her naughty tone; he'd never had anything quite like her before.

"Let's find out, shall we?"


	3. Vulnerability and Sweat

He took her to his room in the Grey Warden compound, specifically mentioning the fact that the walls were thicker than average for soundproofing, for Grey Warden nightmares and Grey Warden appetites.

Apparently, Wardens were hungry for  _everything._

Adrian felt like she was the main course at the end of a long and drawn out meal and he'd not even gotten her robes off yet. Not that it was the usual flailing - even other mages sometimes struggled with all the clasps and hooks and buckles of the more intricate robes. Loghain however seemed intimately familiar with their workings, answering her questions about whether or not the Hero of Ferelden was his lover without ever saying a word. The Hero was a mage after all, and Loghain had the kind of familiarity with her robes that could only come with practice.

Adrian was  _not_  complaining. She wasn't entirely truthful that his past didn't concern her - in fact, it both aroused and unnerved her that she was going to bed the same man as such a powerful woman. Though she did wonder why they weren't still together since Loghain did not give the impression he was particularly free with his attentions, despite the fact that they just met and he was slowly kissing his way from the arch of her foot and up her leg.

She forgot what she was thinking when he reached her knee and paused, inhaling deeply and looking enraptured. He rubbed the soft skin at the back of her knee with a feather touch and Adrian jumped.

"That tickles," she laughed, sounding as is she'd just run up a flight of stairs. She should have been aroused; she was, but fear was creeping down the back of her neck. She tried to shut it up.

He kissed where his finger had touched and then continued north.

"My, my," she said, "I had no idea." She tried to sound confident, but she could hear the waver in her voice. She hoped he would attribute it to her breathlessness and not to her lack of courage.

He paused in his ascent, mid-thigh and looked up at her, his blue eyes hooded in the light from the fireplace and the several candles he had insisted she light using her magic.  _I want to see you;_  it had a dual meaning apparently.

"No idea of what?"

"That you would be so ...thorough," she said, making sure her tone conveyed her level of appreciation for his efforts and masked her trepidation. She wanted this, but she struggled.

He chuckled. "Perhaps I seem...cool, but once my fire is lit, I burn hot."

"How poetic," she replied, weaving her fingers through his hair. Her hand was shaking, but she tried hard to keep it still.

"I have my moments." He continued his journey.

"I was not opposed to the alley, quick and nearly anonymous," she said, trying to sound conversational.  _Maker did that sound as awful to him as it did to her?_  "That is the sort of thing I am used to," she added, suddenly feeling the need to explain herself. "In the tower, I mean, there's no time to foreplay, just...I'm not used to this level of attention."

Loghain stopped and looked up at her. She wondered if he could see how nervous she felt.  _Nervous_  hardly touched the feeling if she was to be honest. She was terrified. Adrian's mouth was usually far braver than the rest of her and despite her sultry language, she was not nearly as experienced or detached as she let on. Rhys was the last man she'd actually slept with, and that had been years ago.

 _Andraste's lacy britches, wasn't that pathetic?_  And here she was with, of all men in all of Thedas, Loghain Mac Tir the Hero of River Dane, Teyrn of somewhere and Grey Warden and Maker knows what else he could lay claim to, between her legs and treating her like a goddess...and she was  _scared._

She wasn't sure if it was performance anxiety or fear he'd get the rest of her robes off and be unimpressed, but she was shaking like a leaf. The alley would have been preferable. No time to think about it.

Loghain slid up gracefully from his more intimate position until he was laying beside her. Now she'd done it. It was going to be over before it started. Adrian closed her eyes. She felt the warm leathery skin of Loghain's fingertips on her chin tilting her face up.

"Open your eyes." He said it quietly but firmly and Adrian complied. She swallowed. "Are you not well?"

"No, I..." She shook her head and looked away. He held her chin so she couldn't turn her head, though she tried.

He waited until she got up her nerve to meet his eyes again. "If you have changed your mind, do not worry yourself about offending me." Loghain gave her a sad smile. "Perhaps I am not what you expected after all? Would you prefer I saw you back to the tower?"

"No, no," she said quickly. That was the last thing she wanted but how did she overcome her own doubts without laying them on him? Oddly, she wanted to tell him everything and she had no idea why that was. She shouldn't..nay, she  _couldn't_ trust him. Hero or no, she'd just met him and besides being a legend, he also had a reputation for treachery. Before becoming a Warden, he nearly destroyed them. He quit the field at that battle that killed the previous King of Ferelden. That was downplayed in the tales, but it was there.

"What is it then?" He was still in the bed, still touching her face which Adrian took as a good sign. She slid her hand up and encircled his wrist, marveling at its thickness and the ridges of the bones. His skin was warm and weathered. Just the heat of his wrist gave her butterflies and sent warmth flushing through her. She wanted this. She just didn't want to disappoint.

"It's...I may talk as if  _this_  is a regular activity of mine," she insinuated instead of just coming out and saying it. "But truth be told, its been years since anyone has touched me other than myself."

He kissed her fingers still on his wrist. "That's nearly a crime." He smiled. "That is something I know well, lady. I spent much of my life without enjoying a woman's touch. Even now, I was concerned about joining you." He looked at her carefully, inspecting her. "Perhaps we should have fewer expectations, and just see what happens? If I have learned nothing else in the Blight and afterwards, it is perhaps that though a moment only comes once, there is no need to force what happens. But do not...worry with me. I don't want you to impress me, and there is nothing to  _live up to_  if that what worries you. We are here together in this room and there is no one else here with us."

He sounded so wise. His voice was soothing and made her feel calm and very, very warm.

"Yes," she said. "You are right." Adrian turned her face to kiss the palm of his hand where it had been laying against her cheek. "I want...I do want you, I just didn't want to disappoint. I am no one special, First Enchanter or no."

"Oh I don't know about that," Loghain chuckled. "I have a particular fondness for special women, even when it has been to my detriment. I have a feeling you are very special indeed."

Loghain was turning out to be a different man than she expected.

"I wasn't expecting to like you so much," Adrian blurted out, her notorious mouth leaping ahead of her brain again. "I honestly thought I could...well, you know, and then continue on with my waiting for your Commander to let me in his office."

"Not my Commander," he replied quickly enough that it seemed to have more than one meaning. "Just the Commander I have to deal with. But I thank you. This isn't the evening I imagined either. I got the impression you were a different sort of woman. Though I think I like this one better."

Adrian felt relieved and suddenly her arousal returned with a vengeance. She moved her hand from his wrist, up his forearm, over the silky hair dusted over the cords of tendons and muscle until she reached his elbow where the sleeve of his tunic was bunched up. Her fingertips felt cool against the heat of his skin. She slipped her hand around his elbow and used his arm to pull herself forward, pressing the length of her body against him.

Calm speech and no expectations aside, her new position made her well aware that he was certainly still more than interested in her physical attentions, even if he thought he might still like to talk to her afterward.

Adrian leaned forward and kissed the hollow between Loghain's collarbones exposed in the vee of his tunic, moving her lips until she felt the pulse in his neck. He lifted one of his longer legs over hers, trapping her thigh tightly against him. He was almost shockingly aroused.

For a second she wondered at him. He was certainly no young man and she'd heard that older men tended to be less  _able_  as they aged. She started to speak before she had a chance to stop herself.

"So is this what happens when you are a Grey Warden?" she asked. "I didn't expect a man your age...oh  _Maker_." She felt herself blushing furiously. "I'm sorry."

Loghain laughed. It was an honest laugh and his arm tightened around her. "For what, noticing I'm not thirty-five?" He laughed again. "I'm aware, and ...actually yes, this  _is_  apparently what happens when you're a Grey Warden, at least when you become one at fifty-one instead of twenty, as most do. Or at least so it seems, since I'm the only Warden of my age that I know of. Most...die young." He didn't explain and Adrian got the impression he wouldn't from the finality his tone.

Adrian shook her head where it was still pressed against his chest. She loved the way he smelled.

"Well, now that I've said another foolish thing," she said. She lifted her head back and looked at him. She searched his face; he looked wry and amused and still comfortable wrapped in her arms and entangled in the bed. Her own stupidity aside, there was no where else she would rather be.

"Maybe," she said, stretching up to put her mouth level with his. "I should do something with my mouth other than talk."

"I have a list," Loghain replied, completely droll.

Adrian gasped a laugh and kissed him. She was sure that was on the list somewhere.

* * *

Adrian's sudden lack of confidence made her endearing. It wasn't in Loghain's plan to find her anything but undressed, but there it was. Then again, he hadn't really had a plan when he walked into this. Yet, instead of being irritated by the idea that there might be someone worth talking to underneath all that red hair, it actually made him feel more relaxed and more willing to go through with it.

He'd felt a little guilty, wanting to just...well, just  _fuck_  her and move on. This felt a bit more like something he could live with, though it was truly the last thing on his agenda. But Loghain quickly reminded himself they weren't getting married or even having a relationship, they were just going to at least be friends as they jumped into bed together.

People do it all the time.

Touching her was certainly satisfying and distracting enough that he didn't waste too many further thoughts on whether on not it was a good idea.

It was an adventure of a different kind, exploring her, especially now that he was trying to be patient - not an easy task considering the effect she was having on him. Probably a sign of his own failure as a human being, but he was more aroused by discovering the vulnerability under her bravado.

Granted, he'd also discovered that it wasn't her robes creating that fetching dip to her waist and plump curve of her hips. That might have something or another to do with the blood thrumming in his ears. He'd never been with a woman like this before. Ferelden women were taller, with broader shoulders and as a general rule more lean. He'd been drawn to warrior women, adventurous types who lived lives that molded their bodies into sleek shapes. Even his proper ladywife Maeve had been slender and strong from her years as her father's assistant.

Adrian was short, shorter than Kya or Maeve had been by several inches. She couldn't have been taller than his shoulders. But she wasn't thin or taut anywhere. She was all soft edges and plumpness. He had no idea if he even liked that until he got his hands on her. Now that he had, he was beginning to rethink his entire opinion of Orlesian women.

It had been long enough now and with Orlais in political turmoil? He was free to enjoy this particular Orlesian bounty with as much enthusiasm as it...as  _she_  deserved.

Loghain hoped that he could convince her to be as brave in his bed as she was outside of it. Maybe not today, but there was always tomorrow. It was going to be some time before a message returned from Weisshaupt, and the Commander being the toady that he was wouldn't even see her until he received it. Add to that this burgeoning friendship and that could that make tomorrow a definite possibility. He had an image in his head of her astride him, illuminated by candlelight with her hair wild around her and now that he had a feel for her body...he growled with sudden impatience.

He rolled on top of her, his brains supplying that image nearly undoing him. He tucked his knees under hers so he could sit up long enough to fling his tunic off over his head - it was as hot as midsummer in here. He also knew women seemed intrigued by the myriad of scars crisscrossing his chest. The hair on his chest had gone grey, but he didn't think she would mind and the breathy sigh and the heat in her eyes reassured him.

With practiced ease, he manged to finish opening his way into her robe, peeling the layers back like a black flower petal opening in the sun, exposing her pale skin to him. She was amazing, all white and pink and amber freckles. Her perfume, vanilla and ambergris and sandalwood, clung to her skin just faintly and he buried his face in her neck to breathe it in more deeply.

He felt her fingers on his hips, cool little fingers curving over the edge of his trews, one reaching in between their bodies to tug at laces. Apparently, she'd gotten over her earlier hesitation, now that they moved past words. He lifted his head to look down at her; shifting his hips to allow her fingers access. Her face was intent with concentration as she deftly untied the laces and loosened them.

Skin touched skin making Loghain chuckle deep in his throat. She didn't bother with smallclothes. Maybe it was an Orlesian affectation or maybe she wasn't quite so hesitant as she seemed before. Either way, there was just a slight change in angle, a shift of his hips and her and then the familiar and yet new sensation of being inside of her. She was small, but she was soft and slick and her thighs were like hot white silk on either side of him.

Adrian made a sound that neared on being a word but didn't quite make it there. He looked down at her, still and hard as a stone but with his hips steady but poised to move. Loghain was amazed at his own restraint, but he stayed still watching her, waiting.

She moved first, fingers digging into his tailbone and her hips pressing up against him. She was stronger than she looked.

Loghain closed his eyes almost involuntarily, a wave of pleasure washing over him. Now that it had begun, now that he was sheathed to the hilt in her, the enthusiasm he'd earlier hoped for appeared. Her entire demeanor changed. The rumor was that she lived up to the reputation that redheads often had; temperamental, passionate and a bit unpredictable. She ground her hips against him, rolling her body like the ocean and he was immeasurably grateful she was exactly as the gossip said.

"Maker," she panted up at him, one hand still firmly on the base of his spine. The other buried itself in his hair that had grown too long in the last years because it seemed to much bother to cut it. Her fist made a tail of his hair, tugging his face closer to hers and at that moment his lack of decision making to cut his hair was handsomely rewarded. He felt her lips move against his; he couldn't hear what she said over the throbbing of his heartbeat as he struggled to control himself.

It had been a long time and he  _wanted_  it all the time. Sixty years old and years of practice were not going to prevent his inevitable release if he moved his hips.

She spoke louder, pulling again on the length of his hair.  _Andraste's blood, how did he never realize how good that would feel until this moment?_

"Please Loghain," Adrian's voice was nearly panicked. "Please."

She didn't have to clarify for him to know exactly what she wanted. His body knew it just as well and let its desire for the same be known with savage intensity. Loghain watched her eyes widen when she felt him move inside her without moving.

"I want it." Her voice was desperate now, her inhibitions evaporated. "Everything."

He moved, carefully. Stilled. Moved again. His breath caught in his throat before he gave in to the animal of his nature and gave her exactly that. He heard a sound before he realized it was his own voice. Adrian was clinging to him, her hips matching his staccato rhythm and her own cries matching his.

She was louder, but that was as it should be.

That was his last thought before he saw stars. For a moment, he wasn't sure if he was having an orgasm or dying.

Once his brain started to function again and he had the sense of mind to shift his weight off of her chest before she suffocated underneath him, it supplied the entirely helpful information that  _bloody hell its been too long since that happened_ and a nice useful addition of _that was over entirely too quickly._

Adrian didn't seem to mind. She seemed content and sweaty, her head lolling against his shoulder. She kissed the ridge of scar tissue that curved over the far end of his collarbone at his shoulder. The infamous West hill scar, but she didn't comment on it. She probably didn't know.

Other than the basics and one sarcastic application of  _your grace_  and she'd hardly mentioned that he was a hero. He liked it.

"So," she said softly, her lips moving against the damp skin on his shoulder. "When can I see you again?"

Loghain surprised himself by replying without hesitation, "In the morning. Now sleep, unless you have some spell to put out the candles first. Because I am definitely not moving until tomorrow." Loghain felt a little breeze and then the room went dark except for the embers from the fireplace. "That's convenient."

He heard Adrian chuckle and then sigh before she curled up a little to be closer, if that was actually possible. He broke his word and moved a bit after all, but only enough to drag the coverlet over the top of them both before falling into a quiet, dreamless sleep.

 


	4. This Thing (Isn't Happening)

Adrian woke up alone.

It took her a moment to get her bearings and remember where she was. Once it hit her, she sat up so quickly her head spun. She looked around the room and there was no sign of Loghain. Instead, the fire had been stoked, making the room pleasantly warm and there was a steaming mug on the table nearby.

Wrapping the coverlet around herself (she wasn't entirely sure where her robes had ended up) she made her way across the room to find hot black tea and a frilly pastry waiting on a plate. It looked like a spiral of bread, but Adrian knew what this was. Inside it would be filled with something wonderful, usually fruit or sweet cheese or if she was lucky, both. Either way, it was a decadent thing to have for breakfast. She smiled at it.

Loghain didn't seem the type to eat pastry for breakfast. She supposed she did and he was nothing if not observant.

Adrian took the cup to take a sip of the tea and discovered a square of parchment folded underneath it. She unfolded it, half expecting a short explanation of why what happened last night couldn't happen again.

_A-_

_Duty calls, but meet me tonight at the lakeshore? We can talk politics. I'll bring wine._

_-L_

Adrian could not have been more pleased. Well, not unless Warden Commander Clarel had returned from where she was and was at the door offering her services to help the Circle break free from the Chantry.

That would be an entirely different sort of gratification, but one she was going to have to return her focus to. This _thing_  was a pleasant distraction, but she had work to do. Hopefully she could find her robes and return to her assistants before they sent out a search party. But first, she was going to eat this pastry and drink this tea and enjoy herself.

There had to be a few perks of being an erstaz First Enchanter and having a little bit of freedom from never ending demands needed to be one of them. It certainly wasn't being well liked. She felt more sympathy for Edmonde now than she ever had while he was alive. Poor bastard.

_Poor Adrian._

She sighed and absently took a bite of the pastry. Cheese and peaches. She missed that in the last year, since they'd cut off the mages from trips into the city back at the Spire. She used to go with Rhys into Val Royeaux and the pastries were always the first stop.

Rhys liked cheese. Adrian liked peaches.

Sometimes, he used to kiss her.

Adrian swallowed hard and it suddenly felt like she ate a mouthful of sand. She gritted her teeth, rinsed away the taste with the bitterness of the tea and tossed the rest into the fireplace.

She'd meet Loghain tonight, but she couldn't forget what this was. It was a way to amuse herself and blow off some steam, but that was all. She couldn't afford to get attached to someone again. She wasn't that sort of girl; not anymore. She had to be the person that was useful and the one that was willing to do and say what had to be done. That's what had gotten her to the head of her fraternity and into her current position. As much as she thought the Circle was a failure, the mages needed someone to lead the charge.

Might as well be her. Who else was it going to be, if it wasn't?

She dressed in silence, the smile she'd worn earlier erased. She overtightened the stays on her robe to make up for the lack of breakfast. It was going to be a very long day - she knew there was a pile of letters and transcripts from sendings on her desk. She was not a tactician, but they still wanted her input on their plans. She was in over her head but she wasn't about to let anyone know that.

But wasn't Loghain some sort of tactical genius? Wasn't that what the stories said? Maybe this  _could_  be something more, though maybe not the more she almost let herself fall into earlier. He was sure to have advice, and it would possibly be as harsh as she needed it to be. There wasn't any more time for messing about. It was time to throw a war.

Adrian glanced back at the table and at the piece of parchment. She felt the sudden urge to take it and tuck it into her cleavage and take it with her. She bit her tongue.

_Knock it off, fool. It's time to work._

To prevent herself from taking it, she tossed it into the fireplace to join the charred remnants of her breakfast. That's where that sort of nonsense belonged.

* * *

The recruits were doing well, at least as well as was to be expected for half educated noble cast offs and laborers drafted off the streets. No one was dead or unconscious yet so that boded well for the rest of the day. Once, the Wardens only trained their own, but with the civil war and the Templar order no longer an option, there was more call for good combat instruction. The Wardens used it to their advantage - they could find those with the greatest potential early, weed out those that would fail and also help line the coffers and maintain some goodwill. It was a beneficial arrangement and one Loghain didn't mind. He'd trained soldiers for years, so this was familiar territory.

He was sweating and sore, but he felt decent enough. The constant irritation of his  _urges_  was temporarily abated and with the promise of being regularly fulfilled for a while at least seemed to put him at ease even despite the irritating itch, like the memory of a song droning in the back of his mind.

It was probably a little foolish, but he was going to enjoy this as long as he could.

He wondered if he should just tell Adrian his suspicions, however. He knew he'd want to know the truth, but he wasn't sure about her yet. He'd have to gauge her if she decided to show at the lake tonight. It was a type of test, he knew, but it was his way. He knew she'd likely stay until the Commander returned or the Constable had official word for her anyway, so it didn't harm his chances for a few weeks of companionship either way so it was more a matter of what sort of constitution she had. Loghain knew she needed to not get her hopes up in expecting this supposed negotiation to go her way. The Constable, a poncy Orlesian named Bernard who gained his position because he was better at kissing ass and had some drops of noble blood than he was in a fight, was not a man of any great imagination. Loghain sincerely doubted he'd be much help to Adrian even if Weisshaupt did give him authority to help her. Commander Clarel was another story. She was his age and tougher than any man he'd ever known. A mage, but as likely to punch a man in the face for disobedience. Wherever she'd gotten off to with all her secrets, he missed her reasonable leadership especially as things got more strained, both inside the compound and outside of it.

It was still too early to tell who would prevail in this - either in the civil war or in this Mage-Templar conflict. The Grey Wardens needed to back whoever was going to win, not who was right or they'd end up exiled, recent Blight or no, just like they had for all those years in Ferelden. It almost cost Ferelden it's very soul. The Wardens were not going to take a chance like that again.

Morality was relative to the Wardens.

It was fairly relative to Loghain himself, he had to admit, but he did have his own code he lived by. He'd also known mages now and he couldn't help but feel sympathy for them. Were they really all that different from Ferelden under the yoke of the Orlesian throne?

It wasn't Orlais or even its people he hated, though the nobility and their games left a bad taste in his mouth. It was the politics and some bastards with more power than decency that forced honorable men like his father to live like outlaws. It just remained to be seen if the mages would be dashing rebels, criminals or only memories once the dust had settled.

The Wardens would just watch and wait and help whoever was winning with their final push, to ensure their place in the new order. But there would be individual wardens fighting on both sides, he was sure.

Loghain wondered if he was too old to fight. He also honestly wondered if he should fight if Warden leadership did as he expected. Sympathy wasn't really enough to sway him one way or the other, at least not without his fellows to fight beside him. If Kya had been fighting? Perhaps he'd be swayed - but Kya was not the type. She was a mage but once she became a Warden, she'd left all those politics behind. And Anora and Alistair? There were rumors they were letting the rebel mages stay unmolested in Ferelden, at least that was how it seemed from the rumors. But he wasn't sure that helped sway him. He wasn't returning to Ferelden unless he had no other options. There were too many hearts to break.

Anora thought he was dead; they both did, so he thought he should stay that way.

He considered challenging Adrian to convince him, to debate the subject. That might be novel, seeing if she knew truly what she was fighting for. She'd probably shout - she seemed the type. Shout and growl and grit her teeth and tell him he was a bloody idiot for challenging her. She'd have fire in her eyes.

He liked fire. He was pretty singed around the edges, but he didn't mind like he had as a young man.

Once, he'd surrounded himself in ice and was cold as a grave. Now? He could use some warmth in his old bones. He'd honestly expected to be dead a decade ago. He probably should have gone to the Deep Roads anyway, left the surface and went off to die in battle like something out of a story. But he was too practical for that. And he still had a use or two, training men and forcing young leaders to think.

He still wished he'd been able to do that for Cailan. He'd tried to steer the boy for years before he'd finally given up on him. Maybe he could make up for it again by pointing another little mage towards something better. He'd done well by Kya Amell, though to be honest, she'd changed him more than he'd changed her.

His vanity told him he could make a difference with Adrian, even more than he had with Kya or Cailan. He'd done a damn fine job with Anora, after all.

Granted, there were other perks involved in this particular arrangement, but somehow having an ulterior motive was comforting to him. Because frankly, he wasn't going to have another type of relationship with her. He was too old and he'd had enough heartbreak to last several lifetimes.

There was exactly no way it was a good idea. It was absurd. It was idiocy. It wasn't going to happen.


	5. Admissions of Guilt

Loghain was waiting for her.

When Adrian came over the rise of the cliff, working her way down the path towards the little patch of sandy beach, she saw his dark silhouette boldly painted against the pale sky. Since Montsimmard was on the east of the lake, the sun seemed to disappear into the water of Lake Celestine from this vantage point. But it was a bit late for the real beauty of the sunset; the sun having already gone down below the horizon. There were still a few snips of orange and pink reflecting on the wispy clouds, but mostly it was just the pale blue grey of twilight settling down over the landscape.

On a nearby shelf of flat rock she could see a wine bottle and a pair of glasses and in the sand, an empty bottle, his boots and tunic laying askew. She squinted her eyes at him, surprised to find him barefoot in the sand in only trousers and his linen undershirt.

That seemed so... _human._

Adrian had walked barefoot on the beach once or twice over the years herself and those were fond memories. Val Royeaux bordered the Waking Sea and the shore was littered with beautiful stretches of beach, though much of the sand there was white and hard instead of the smooth black and tan here. In recent years, even before the lock down into the Spire, she hadn't made the time. Sand between her toes seemed like a fond remembrance of her own youth and didn't seem to fit the image of Loghain she'd created in her head.

She swallowed a moment of nervous tension and continued down the path, shoulders back and head high hoping she would look confident. She couldn't focus on anything but what she could gain from this. She needed the Grey Wardens. Loghain was the only warden actually willing to talk to her. If she needed to keep his attention with sex, so be it, but she would do whatever it took to get their support.

That's what she told herself anyway.

She pulled her shoulders back further and strutted down the path to Loghain, acting as if she had all the confidence in the world. If she didn't really feel it, there was no reason he had to know. She did realize that a little vulnerability seemed to please him, but she had to be smart about when to use it. It had to be on her own terms, and not the whims of her emotions.

Loghain heard her coming apparently, and slanted a glance at her over his shoulder. Adrian admired the way the fine linen of his shirt moved across the broad expanse of his back. There was a little halo of light rimming his hair from the last sunlight glinting off the water. It was a little too much like one of those novels Rhys read. She tried not to think about it.

"Adrian," he said, picking up one of the glasses from the rock nearby as he swung around to face her. "I have something for you to try."

"Oh?" Adrian replied questioningly. His manner was very relaxed, maybe a bit excessively relaxed but that might have been caused by the empty bottle next to his boots. The idea of a slightly drunk and maybe pliable Loghain immediately put her at ease. "Is this what you were drinking in the inn?"

"This is  _almost_ what I was asking for in the tavern. A caravan just came in today from Ferelden with something even better." His glee was surprisingly infectious. He handed the glass to her with a flourish. The liquid inside was the color of a garnet and smelled sweetly of berries.

Loghain gestured to her to take a sip and Adrian complied. It was very sweet yet strong, with a powerful tang of an unfamiliar fruit. It was possibly the best wine she'd ever tasted.

"What is this?" she asked, surprised at how wonderful it was and more than a little surprised that Loghain would be so enamored of such a sweet drink.

"It is called Morat," he said, taking another reverent sip. "Which is a surprisingly Orlesian sounding name for a Ferelden drink" He frowned a little. "It probably came about during the occupation, but I try not to think about it."

"It is ... amazing," Adrian had to admit taking another sip and swirling the liquid around in her mouth. "And maybe you should think about it." Maker, this was probably dangerous territory, but her brain made a sudden connection and she felt like she needed to follow it. "I know what happened to your homeland was a terrible thing, but I'm sure there were moments and things that happened that give some silver to that thundercloud."

Loghain was frowning hard, but he didn't speak.

"This wine, for example," Adrian continued, probably stupidly, considering his expression. "It is a sweet and wonderful thing, born of Ferelden and Orlais. Not so terrible, when they are working together instead of at odds." It looked like he was going to speak, but Adrian raised her hand to stay him. "And then there is you, such a person could never have existed without the interaction of the two molding you into who you are."

The frown nudged into scowl territory.

"I cannot imagine a reason why that is a good thing," he snapped at her. "You are young; young enough to not have known the true impact of the occupation. You are also Orlesian, so you were not there to see the damage done to Ferelden. You did not see the countryside filled with dead husbands and wives and children." He took a deep breath. "So I will not fault you for trying, but let me assure you that there was nothing good that came of the occupation. I would rather I and this wine not even exist if it meant that those horrors would have never happened."

Adrian's idea of seducing Loghain into helping her went right down the privy.

She knew a lot of terrible things happened during the occupation. How it did not occur to her than a man that threw himself into the fight in the most spectacular way, the Maker blasted Hero of River Dane, would not have a horror story of his own? She swallowed the rest of the wine in her glass. Despite being sweet, it burned on the way down.

"Oh Maker, I am...beyond idiocy," she said quietly. She was tempted to reach out and touch him, but she had a feeling he wouldn't welcome it. She balled up her fist instead and let her nails bite into the palm of her hand. "I wanted...I just wanted to find a way to allude that perhaps you and I could work together. I didn't..."

Loghain shook his head. "I know. But there are some things..." He looked away from her, staring off over the water at the dying light.

"Is there...can you ever forgive me for being insensitive?"

He didn't look at her when he replied. "Yes, but we'll need to finish this bottle first."

Adrian cringed. "I am so sorry..." He cut her off.

"Don't," he said, still not turning to face her. Adrian's cheeks were burning. Loghain's face in profile was white as bleached bone. "You don't need to apologize to me. I think I've hated Orlais enough...you didn't see me, know me ten years ago when I let my unending paranoia nearly allow the darkspawn to swallow Ferelden whole. Yet, I think about the occupation and I remember...my mother, my father, my mabari...and I still can't think straight."

He quickly downed the rest of his glass and refilled it and hers, reassuring Adrian that she hadn't completely botched everything. She'd been so worried about her place in this that she'd completely forgot she was coming to meet a person here on this beach. Not to mention, a person with a history that was more than just some half remembered stories.

He drank the glass of wine so fast she wondered it he'd even tasted it.

"Let me tell you a story," he said, his words carefully enunciated. Too carefully.

She was not sure what to say to any of this, odd feeling as it was, but she was all ears for anything he had to say. She owed him that much for blundering into such sensitive territory. "Please do."

"Both my parents, all my family in fact, and even my childhood mabari were murdered by occupying Orlesians, some of whom were as born and bred in Ferelden as I was. The only difference was what side of an imaginary line we were on."

It was a statement of fact, delivered with such cold precision that Adrian shuddered. Loghain's face was completely devoid of expression.

"I have now lived in Orlais as a Grey Warden for ten years. In that time, I've tried to reconcile my carefully tended hatred with the world around me. I've come to realize that line was even more arbitrary than I realized. It was about who had the money and therefore the power. On each side of the line there were monsters and saints."

His face fell a bit at that last bit. Adrian wasn't sure what that meant until he continued.

"But that was the bit I didn't realize in my youth. Though I still hold fast that Ferelden deserves its hard earned freedom, I believed that the only difference between a saint and a monster was which side of the line they stood on. During the Blight, I ignored my own honor and stood staunchly on what I saw as the right side of the line...yet still became a monster." Loghain cleared his throat.

He didn't pause long enough for Adrian to speak, not that she had the faintest idea what to say. He was just spilling his guts, as if she was a trusted confidante and not a barely new acquaintance he'd happened to bed.

"I sold men into slavery. I could say I sold  _elves_ as if that somehow justifies my actions. But before the Blight and the war I'd never thought of elves as any different than I was. Though they lived in the alienages, that was not by decree or law here in Ferelden, it was by choice, even during the occupation. I led a company of elves and archers - their eyesight was better in the dark and their skills were beyond reproach. I trusted them with my life and never for one moment did I think less of them than any other man. Yet when the moment came, I signed the papers and sold them into lives of servitude in Tevinter." He sighed again, shaking his head. "I told myself 'at least they will survive' but I knew it was a lie, even then. I fought for my own freedom. Surviving isn't enough."

Finally, he turned his face towards her. He seemed to inspect her, the furrow between his eyes brows deeply shadowed.

"Once, I shouted at a room full of noblemen and the few Grey Wardens left in Ferelden. I dared them to judge me, since none of them had sacrificed more for Ferelden than I had. But they were right and I was a fool. I became everything that is wrong in the world in my attempt to save it. So don't...apologize to me, for any of it." He shook his head. "I had no right."

She'd heard about this, among other things. There were plenty of Orlesians happy to smear his name. All in all, the majority still thought of him as a romantic figure, but he was tarnished now and there was no point in denying it.

Then again, Adrian herself was hardly polished to a high shine.

"It sounds to me like you were desperate," she said. "For whatever reason, you thought you were all that stood between your... _beloved_  and ruin. Whether that love was a place or a cause or a woman should hardly matter."

"I suppose I shouldn't be surprised you are the type of woman who would know that the ends can be used to justify the means. I am sure you didn't rise to the top of the tower by looks alone, as adorable as you are." He tried to smile a little, but it didn't have the ring of sincerity about it.

"No, I didn't. I would say it was by a lucky application of artifice and attrition," she admitted. "I could tell you a story of my own, more personal than national, but the same none the less. Though I admit I'm not certain I am as brave as you are to tell it."

"I'm not brave, I'm drunk," Loghain said, picking up the bottle in swirling the last dregs of wine in the bottom of the bottle. "When it comes time for my Calling, I plan on being drunk the entire time. I was drunk on love the last time I thought to go, but that's...only a memory now."

"Your Calling?" Adrian was perplexed, about both this  _Calling_  business and the  _love_  even more so, though one thing at a time. He waved her question away.

"Not important," he said making it clear he wasn't going to explain that bit further. "Tell me your story. I'm in no position to judge you."

"I murdered a Tranquil." She spit it out like a curse. Loghain raised an eyebrow.

"Cold blooded murder doesn't seem your type of fun." He was droll.

"No, no it's not." Adrian really didn't want to continue. She knew it had to be done, but with more distance between the heat of the moment and now, it was easier to see her guilt and not the need that drove her to it. "And perhaps  _euthanized_  is the more appropriate word, since the man begged me to do it. But that's hardly the true crime, though I'm sure if the Lord Seeker was aware, he'd happily tack it on to the list of crimes he plans to execute me for."

"Seekers sound like Grey Wardens, except with more crazy." He was right about that.

Adrian cracked a smile. "They are obsessed and insane, but they aren't totally wrong about me. You see, I needed the Aequitarians to agree to cede from the rule of the Chantry. Without them, I didn't have the numbers to fight. But Wynne would not budge. I started to hate her stubborn cool."

"She could certainly hold an opinion to the depths of the black City, that woman," Loghain added.

"I needed to force her hand. There was no other way," Adrian continued. And then, there it was. "So I killed the Tranquil and framed Wynne's son for the deed. Which would be bad enough, but that he was my best friend and once upon a time my lover. I betrayed him to the templars and risked his life to get Wynne to support my cause. And what's worse, instead of her support, she ended up giving her life to save a templar...the templar who Rhys had fallen in love with during our...," she snorted. "... _Adventures_  all while happily falling out of love with me." She stopped, shook her head. "Though that's probably indulgent. He'd been out of love with me for some time. I'm not the type for that sort of business."

"I'm sure you're quite lovable," Loghain said. "Though any son of Wynne's was bound to be a bit too squeamish for a girl like you."

"I doubt that's a compliment," Adrian groused. He smiled this time.

"Maybe not," he admitted. "But your practicality is more appealing to me that any insincere display of guilt would be. Perhaps you can understand how I feel more than most. I did monstrous things during the Blight, but I would not take them back. Any step taken differently and perhaps the darkspawn would have had us all, just like you know that Wynne's life and your friendship with her son were sacrifices that had to be made in the name of your freedom."

"I should feel terrible," Adrian said. "But I don't and I think I  _do_  feel terrible about that."

"I understand completely." Loghain drank the last bit of wine from the bottle and frowned at the empty glass. It was nearly dark now, so she couldn't really see his face.

Whatever she'd hoped for, well, it had included a desire for a promise to help review maps in the morning, after she successfully exhausted him. A part of her was even more interested in that now; this commonality of failed morals made her feel a deeper connection to him. The sharing of transgressions made for an interesting bond. She wished she could see his face and read his expression to see if he felt the same.

"I could use another drink," he said, dropping the bottle into the sand. "But since that's no longer an option, maybe I'll bend you over this rock instead and see if I can punish both of us for our misdeeds."

 _Well._  Apparently he did.

 


	6. Wine and Regrets

That was vulgar.

Loghain wasn't entirely proud of that last bit, though his head was muzzy enough that he wasn't able to collect a complete feeling of embarrassment. He wanted her, true enough, yet at the same time she put him off a little. He wasn't sure he'd realized it before, but she was sharp. Not like a knife's edge perhaps, but sharp like the sound of cutlery on china, or like the uncomfortable feeling of dry clay on your fingers.

He shook his head at Adrian. It made his eyesight go a little wobbly. He hated Adrian in that moment as much as he wanted her. Her hair was the wrong shade of red and too curly, her eyes were the wrong shape, she wasn't wise or patient or strong and beautiful and she wasn't Rowan or Kya and he hated her for it. But he wanted her anyway. He wanted to hurt her and he wanted to fall in love with her and he wanted to never see her again.

He really shouldn't drink this much.

It made him feel like he'd lost his Maker forsaken mind. He wanted to give in and by the Fade, he ought to give in after the dozens of times he nearly lost Kya for his inability to accept her affections. Or after he sacrificed everything to Maric and for Ferelden, whom he both hated and loved as much as anything. But he had lost Kya anyway, hadn't he? He knew in his heart he could have gone back, or sent the letter. She might likely have left the Howe boy for him, no matter what they thought they had together. She was his, wasn't she? It was only his death...Maker...his death that separated them, wasn't it?

Or maybe he was as vain as Eamon thought he was. It was beyond speculation now. His real part in history and events was over. He was just a man now, standing on a beach with a woman.

And wasn't that the real tragedy? Even now, this woman, warm and soft and just standing there waiting for him to take her in his arms and he's still as a stone, pensively fretting about his honor and his past, as if either of them even mattered anymore.

Loghain tried to push it away, all of it, and just be in the moment, it wasn't something he was good at. He was either mired in the past or planning the future. Every moment was just an afterthought to what had come before and what was coming to pass. All he'd missed was his actual life.

He looked down at Adrian, the little glint of her teeth letting him know she was still smiling, slightly at least, or maybe her mouth was open in shock.

What had he said again? Something vulgar and worth of an alley? Something like that. His brain was only partially engaged with his mouth at the moment.

Her mouth closed. He couldn't see it, but he would bet her lips were pursed instead.

"Loghain?" She sounded concerned.

"I am sorry," he managed finally. He heard the slur in his own voice this time. Grey Warden or no, apparently there was a limit to even his tolerance for alcohol. "Too much wine makes me think. Even more than usual, with significantly less logic. I shouldn't blame you if you wanted more congenial company."

Adrian shook her head at him. "I insulted you and you apologize? You are a strange creature Loghain Mac Tir." She clicked her tongue at him. "If I wanted different company, I wouldn't have sought you out. Your offer made it quite easy to walk away, as I am sure you intended. But I find I enjoy your company, morose though you might be at times. The seriousness appeals to me, I think. Rhys was never serious, even when he was serious. It grated on me at times, but in the tower there is a limited amount of companions available. I took what I could get."

"And now that you can choose," Loghain replied with copious sarcasm, "you decide on an old man who thinks too much. Brilliant taste."

"You are too hard on yourself," she said simply. "I have excellent taste. " She didn't elaborate, but it sounded a good deal like honesty.

"I'm not sure if I should apologize for being a pig, or just follow through with my sexual threats." It wasn't the whole truth, but it was close as he could manage without shouting his insanity at her.

Adrian laughed at him. She had a deep, throaty chuckle. It made him cringe and feel too warm. He liked it.

"Well, I should think it might be preferable to find more privacy before beginning my reeducation, though I find I'm not opposed to the idea." She was mockingly formal.

"Not a bad suggestion," he acquiesced, stumbling back a bit and falling back against the boulder, as if it had been carefully placed there to prevent him from losing his feet and disgracing himself entirely. "But I doubt I'd make it to the compound without assistance. Apparently I need to add impulse control to my list of faults. That is a new development, I'm afraid. Perhaps an improvement? I honestly don't know."

And that was truthful at least. Impulse control had never been a problem for Loghain. In fact, Maric would have watched this spectacle with intense satisfaction. That man had tried to get Loghain drunk more times than he could count but had only succeeded with great rarity. Considering his current status as a Warden and the sheer quantity of alcohol he'd ingested today...it would have amused Maric to the ends of Thedas.

"I would think it is," she said, seemingly agreeing with him. Or so he thought. It wasn't entirely clear. "You do seem the type that could benefit from some relachement."

"You are not the first to say that," Loghain admitted, trying not to be disturbed that the old Orlesian word peppered into her sentence needed no translation. Anyone who'd ever known him well enough to speak freely had mentioned his tension and the complete inability to relax once, twice, or three hundred times.

"Either way" she paused a bit. "Since it appears you'll need a bit of time before walking or other abuses can occur." She smiled at that and Loghain noticed the waning moon had started to rise, illuminating her face. "And since it is obvious that I cannot carry you back to the compound or the tower..." She continued smiling, a little dimple in her cheek winking at him. He was fairly certain it was the Morat talking, but that dimple was absolutely devastating him. "I think we should instead tell more truths."

He raised an eyebrow at her. He was just barely controlling himself as if was. What might he admit now, with only a little prodding...?

"So the admissions of my crimes wasn't quite enough to sate you?" he asked, almost fearing what else she could possibly want to know.

"Crimes are one thing, and definitely a thing of note, but this wine has gone straight to my head and I find myself completely uninterested in war and conflict at the moment." Adrian cocked her head at him and seemed to hesitate a bit. "I'd rather know what it's like to be  _drunk on love_...that was how you put it, no? That seems far more interesting."

"Ah," Loghain said carefully. This was far, far worse. "That's...harder for me." He took a deep breath, but was puzzled at the lack of the familiar tightness in his chest when he contemplated emotional matters. "Though I find I don't feel as reluctant as I might expect. I suppose that is what wine does, after all."

Did she really want to hear this? He supposed his love stories were compelling, though he was no bard. It was something out of a romance tale, the commoner and the queen-to-be, the fallen hero and the reluctant Grey Warden.

They  _were_  good stories.

"I suppose it doesn't hurt to tell the stories now. After all, I am dead as far as much of the world is concerned. And I would think at this point I am unimportant enough that any fear I once had of besmirched reputations and honor is moot."

"Oh, I think you have plenty of honor still," she said. Loghain assumed she was stroking his ego but he didn't mind. It seemed to quiet the madness a little. "But I know how to keep a secret. It comes with the job."

Loghain nodded in agreement. It was hard, running things. He remembered.

"Well, I can tell you all the lurid details you desire of my escapades, of course, but I'm sure you know what I was speaking of. Being so wrapped up in love that it propels you through, despite odds against you?"

Adrian shook her head. "No, I don't think that I do."

"What about this man you spoke about, Wynne's son? Rhys was it?"

"No, that was the love of a friend, perhaps the love of familiarity. I cared for Rhys and we were intimate for a time, but he did not love me like that. I thought I loved him, I suppose, but if I truly had, his lack of drive wouldn't have wedged between us. Shouldn't it take more than that to take you from someone you truly love? It was only a minor annoyance at his level of ambition, although I see now that perhaps it was just a convenience to blame it upon." Adrian shrugged. "I've thought about it a lot and mostly I find myself saddened by it all. I wasted the time I had when life was simple with worrying about what is finally happening now. I probably should have spent more time trying to find love and less time being angry." Her eyes flickered out over the water and she seemed far away.

"We probably all should, though love is rarely something you can find, more something that is thrust upon you." Loghain snorted a laugh; that sounded dirty.

_Not the time, Mac Tir._

Makers Breath, was this what being drunk did to him? Removed the ability to have any sense of propriety? He cleared his throat. "Puns aside, I still find it hard to believe that you fell in love with no one, nor they with you. "

A cloud flickered across her expression and she shrugged noncommittally again. "I am good at pushing people away."

"That sounds familiar." Loghain sighed and added, "Poor Maeve."

Adrian perked at that, apparently pleased to turn the conversation away from herself. "Who is Maeve?"

"She was my wife." Loghain frowned. "She was a good woman. A decent and lovely woman; a doting wife and mother...except that I did not love her like I should have. I was well and fully fixed on what I had given up, what I had sacrificed. It made it impossible to be able to enjoy what was right in front of me. I think that is where the crack between us began, between the Maric and I. He trusted me, though perhaps he should not have, but I did not trust his judgement. At least not where matters of the heart were involved." He made a disgruntled noise. "Maric did not always think with his head."

"Maric...you mean the once King of Ferelden, Maric?" Adrian's face was pricelessly surprised. "This must be a tale worth hearing."

"I'm sure you know the story, the rogue prince and his companions, overthrowing the Orlesian occupation," he began.

"Of course I do," she said. "It is a much beloved story, at least for those of us of common and misfortunate birth."

"And then you know of Maric and myself, of Rowan and the treacherous spy, Katriel." He certainly hoped so. He still had the most mixed of feelings about that elven spy. He wasn't sure he wanted to talk about that.

"Yes, Maric's lover, who betrayed him, no?" She sounded positively enraptured. It was both adorable and annoying. This story shaped him and nearly destroyed him. It was more than a story, but he was the only one alive to remember that.

"To be blunt, Rowan Guerrin was not one to just sit back and watch while her supposed betrothed spread his seed about," he said and immediately grimaced. "That was less than graciously put."

Adrian raised her eyebrows but stayed carefully silent.

"Nonetheless, I cannot deny that I loved her. She was an amazing woman. Any perhaps it was my good luck that Maric broke her heart. She was mine, for a time, before I had to give her back to Ferelden. Maric would have fallen to pieces without her in those days after Katriel was dead. I gave Rowan up for the love of country and king." He snorted. "Kya Amell too. For duty and death came between us. So poetic, isn't it?"

Loghain made a grand hand gesture, waving his arm up at the sky. Just as dramatically, his hand dropped hard to his side. It was all just a series of grand gestures for the greater good and with quite very little left for himself.

"I'm so sorry," Adrian said after an awkwardly long pause. "I think perhaps I do have the better bargain, having not known real love. Then there is nothing lost."

Loghain sighed sadly. "That would seem logical, yet I think perhaps I would be a lesser man without it, painful as it as has been."

"Ah," she replied softly. "That seems...what I expected."

"Oh?" His confusion was genuine. He turned his head to look at her closely and found the world already seemed more stable. This Grey Warden metabolism was a wonder.

"I have often thought that I missed out on more than just the feeling, when it came to love," Adrian began. Her tone was perfunctual, clinical. Loghain could tell she was hiding behind it. "It seems like it makes you...or maybe just takes a better person to experience it. I wonder if I lack for empathy because of it, or if I lack love because I lack compassion?" She shrugged again, though the motion seemed forced. "As I said, there had been too much time to think and not enough time throwing fireballs in my life."

"There is nothing like a battle to temporarily wash away the grey and leave a nice black and white view of the world," Loghain agreed.

They both went silent then. Loghain could almost hear her thoughts racing in the silence, wondering if the wine had sent her mind wandering some of the same twisted and sad paths his had. She looked drawn and smaller, her arms wrapped around her like armor and little tendrils of curls wafting against her face. She reminded him of painting he once saw, a painting of a woman floating in a river as she drowned in her own sorrow.

No, this wasn't the way to spend another night. Enough pensive bullshit.

"So tell me Adrian," he blurted out, breaking the awkward silence. "That first night in the inn, when you caught me staring at you, what was it that got your attention? It was not the first night we'd both wallowed in solitude there nor the first time I looked at you longer than I should have, but it was the first time I saw you give me much more than a careful glance."

"To be honest?" she replied, her little smile washing away that faraway look in her eyes. "It was your reaction to my magic."

"I don't recall having one," he said. He'd outgrown any fear of magic living with Kya. Not that he planned on going around blurting it out, not even now as it wasn't his secret to tell, but Kya was blood Mage after all. Despite all the dire warnings from the chantry, magic was just a sword of will instead of steel. He understood that now.

"You didn't and that was rare enough to intrigue me," she said. Her smile was sincere now. "Most are afraid, the rest want to use it. But not you. You just looked like you been reminded of something sweet."

"People are afraid of what they do not know and I am no different," he replied. "Though I have known many mages, before Amell..."

That was the name he'd once used to distance himself from her; it felt greasy in his mouth. Should be Howe now anyway. He didn't correct himself. No, that would be even more awkward.

He continued before the pause seemed overlong. "Before Amell, I did not trust magic. But after she defeated me at the Landsmeet, it was as if all my errors came into vivid relief. I felt I had no right to judge her; she was my commander and I'd done worse things than simply using a gift the Maker gave me. She showed me magic was just a tool. Not even just a weapon, but a tool for both destruction and creation. After a while, it was just no different to me than any other weapon, another healing poultice. It was nothing to fear or remark on...though it was always most handy in a fight."

"And you wonder why I want to spend my time with you?" Adrian was almost beaming now. "I am fighting a war for my freedom. For the freedom of all mages. But I never wanted to have more than anyone else. I just want to make my own decisions for how to best live my life. Even if you cannot fight with me, if your current Commander refuses to see reason and sends me away, you see me as a woman, not just a mage. My being a Mage seems almost unimportant to you. How could I not want to be near that?"

"Then come here," he said, this time, trying to keep focused on the matter at hand. Maybe he wasn't sober enough to get back to the compound, but he was drunk enough that having her right here on this rock seemed like a perfectly reasonable idea.

They were so different, this little mage and he. Yet they were very, very much alike at the same time. A part of him wanted to hate her, he could see that now. He wanted to punish her and himself. But it was folly and she didn't deserve any measure of the hatred he punished himself with. Adrian was far more fragile than she let on, and was was going to need all her strength in the days to come. He wondered if maybe by his affection, he could lend her what was left of his. He didn't need it so much anymore. There wasn't anything left to fight against except inevitability. He was not so foolish as a young man to try to win that battle.

In the end, while it was true that she wasn't Rowan or Kya or even Maeve, he found it didn't really matter. She was here and they were not. He'd let the rest of them go to duty and death, for King and country. The only thing stopping him was his natural propensity to hesitate and overthink things too close to the soft parts of him.

Enough already.

Loghain offered her his hand and let her come to him; she flowed into his arms like warm water. He leaned down to kiss her, imagining the shadows of their silhouettes black against the little light reflecting off the water. The part of him that didn't want to hate her wanted to love her, but something seemed missing. He couldn't help but wonder if she wasn't right. Maybe she was missing some vital something. But then again, his heart had been well and fully battered. He still wanted to hate her for not being the right woman, but he found he couldn't do that either.

She was just the wrong mixture of sweet and abrasive and her mouth tasted like mulberries.


	7. Surrender

She wasn't sure how it happened, but suddenly there was a Loghain shaped presence in her life.

They never actually made love that night after the beach, Adrian just barely managing to get the still half drunk and suddenly sleepy Loghain back to her rooms in the tower. That morning she didn't wake up alone, but instead tangled into a knot of limbs and blankets.

And then, despite their best intentions, being together simply became normal.

They would work and then at sunset find one another as if it was just  _expected_. After a while, Adrian became so used to him; at her table, as her sounding board, in her bed that when he was absent, that was when things felt strange.

_How did that happen?_

Loghain moved into her life as if he'd always belonged there. A month passed and then two. Eventually she began to hope the Grey Warden messenger had been eaten by a darkspawn and never returned. As much as it maybe wasn't what she'd expected from her time here, it was certainly a comfortable and understanding sort of companionship that she'd never experienced before and it was one she wasn't in a hurry to give up.

Summer blossomed and faded, the daylight shrinking just as the war continued to magnify. It was still safe in Montsimmard, but only just. Scouts, wounded from both conflicts; nobility and mages and seekers trickled in. Only a few thankfully, but most so broken even magic couldn't save them.

Adrian rethought her desire to fight when she watched her first soldier die as the best trained healers failed to save him.

She tried to learn a healing spell, but she just couldn't manage it. It was as in the mana funneled through her was incapable of anything but destruction. Even the attempt at turning the elemental force into something else made cold sweat pool at the base of her spine. She tried not to think about it.

The one real solace at the end of the day was the stolidly unchanging arrival of Loghain.

This night, after another failed attempt at healing magic and a long shuffle through a mound of dire reports from the war, Adrian climbed into bed early. The sun was still going down when she traded her robes for a nightgown and curled up in her bed under the covers with the fire chasing off the threatening chill in the air. A cool, damp draft spun a paper off the desk on to the floor, but she just let it flutter down, with a book open but ignored on her lap. Her eyes took in the blue grey of the sliver of sky between the curtains, but she just drifted. There was too much to do, too much to think about to do anything at all.

She rubbed her eyes. The least she could try to do is read the damn book, but the words were all running together. It wasn't even really a book, but just a bound copy of the manifesto written by that Fereldan Grey Warden mage, Anders. It was important. Many mages held him up as an example, but others blamed him just as fiercely. There were also dark rumors that swirled around him, but Adrian tried to focus on what facts she had. She held most of them in her hand, yet she still struggled to concentrate on the words.

_Andraste suffered at the hand of the Magisters, thus she feared the influence of magic. But if the Maker blamed magic for the actions in the Black City, why would he still gift us with it? The oppression of mages stems from the fears of men, not the will of the Maker._

Maybe or maybe not, but how did that help her now? She didn't know how to reconcile this obsession with religion as the basis of his argument. What did it matter what the Chantry or the Maker thought? Even if it was true (and she had no proof the Maker even existed) the Maker has turned away from Thedas. Who cared what he thought? He was like her own father; throwing her away when she didn't live up to his expectations.  _What sort of loving parent did that?_

The door swung open slowly and Adrian looked up. The door let in surprisingly less noise than usual as well as a weary looking Loghain, who glanced back over his shoulder.

"It's quiet," he said perfunctorily as he closed the door.

Adrian felt her brow furrow. "That's odd. It's still daylight, isn't it?"

Loghain nodded. "Indeed, which begs the question of why you're already in bed?"

"Trying to read," she said, pointing at the open book but then flopping back against the pillow and dramatically draping her arm across her eyes. "It's not working."

She felt Loghain sit down on the bed beside her, the faint scent of the leather breeches and jerkin he wore to train touching her like gentle fingers. Adrian peeked at him underneath her forearm and saw him pick up the book.

"The oppression of mages stems from the fears of men, not the will of the Maker," he read in his rich, careful voice. "And it is only the actions of men they fear, not magic. Any man, any elf, can kill or destroy. The weapon used does not matter."

She saw Loghain raise an eyebrow at that.

"Go on," Adrian encouraged. "It sounds better when you read it than it does in my head."

He chuckled and cleared his throat.

"It is the nature of men and elves that the Chantry fears. This is the legacy of the Maker we carry with us, this nature, these innate urges and desires. But above all, we all desire only to survive and to be free. There are those among all living things that are broken, that are beyond redemption, but we do not destroy all the Mabari because of the bite of one."

Loghain rolled his eyes at that. "A bit melodramatic, don't you think?" he asked.

Adrian shrugged. "I supposed, but we mages due tend to err on the side of too much." She snorted. "That's probably the worst thing to  _fear_  about mages. Purple prose and histrionic manifestos."

Loghain looked amused. "So true," he said. "But I suppose whoever wrote this bit of ostentation does have a point under his metaphors and I find myself agreeing with him."

He picked up the book and continued a bit further.

"Mages, then, are no different from other men. We deserve the chance to survive and to be free. We will no longer allow ourselves to be punished for crimes we have not committed."

"You read eloquently," Adrian said, sitting up and leaning against Loghain's shoulders. The leather scent was strong and mixed with clean sweat. It was a potent perfume. "Next time I'll have you read  _The Rose of Orlais_."

"I keep hearing about this damnable book," he said, shaking his head. "Never taken the time to read it, but I have to assume it's quite the tale."

Adrian snickered. "I've never read it either. Not sure I'd enjoy reading about other people making love. I think it would make me jealous."

Loghain conveniently dropped the book over the edge of the bed, where it flipped closed and slid out of reach. He put a finger under Adrian's chin turning her to face him.

It was such a small gesture, but it made butterflies take flight behind her ribs. Adrian wondered how he could make her feel so comfortable, yet so bewildered at the same time.

He looked down at her, his pale blue eyes shining with mischief. The hint of a smile played on his lips.

It was these moments Adrian breathed in like air. Rhys hadn't ever look at her like this, even in the most brilliant heat of his feelings for her. He laughed at everything, even at her desire for him. It used to make her feel small.

Without speaking again, Loghain leaned in and kissed her gently; once and then again.

"Jealousy is a very bitter taste," he said, kissing her again, lips slightly moist and tasting faintly of salt.

Adrian looked at him through her eyelashes. "Does that mean you're going to stop?"

"No," he said quickly. "I doubt any book could compare to you. I don't believe there's any need for jealousy." Loghain raised up her chin as he nuzzled underneath, the coarse stubble on his face scratching against the tender flesh of her throat.

Adrian shivered; he knew it tickled her and aroused her all at once when he did that. He'd even taken to shaving less frequently or at least it seemed. Not that she found it a problem, at that.

His breath was damp in the hollow of her neck as he drew his cheek along her collar bone. He kissed the peak of her shoulder reverently. Adrian sighed and tangled her fingers in his hair. Loghain stilled for a moment. If he was a cat, he might have purred at the gentle kneading of her fingertips against his scalp.

She'd learned what he liked and it was the most liberating thing to let herself just give him what he wanted, knowing he'd be fighting to do the same in return. This was like nothing she'd known before. Not that there hadn't been frantic couplings and moments of just passion and little thinking, but more often it was closer to alchemy than the sex she'd experienced before.

Two parts fingertips.

One part lips.

And then ingredients she'd only read about before him.

_She lied. She'd read The Rose of Orlais. Twice._

Maybe it was her - she was so inside herself, so locked down under all that loud bravado that she'd never let anyone close enough to know what she liked. It was a competition in the Spire, and one she knew she'd lose. She hated to lose, so she rarely played the game.

But she played Loghain like a master bard at a harp.

Playfully, she pushed him back against the bed, his long legs still draped over the edge. She swung a leg over him and carefully straddled him, intentionally just grazing against him with just the lightest feathered touch.

He opened his eyes, only enough to see her through his eyelashes, a languid smirk on his face.

Adrian shook her hair over her shoulder as she leaned on her palms, one carefully on either side of his head. She bent down close enough to kiss him, but instead ran her lips along his cheek, so as she spoke he could feel her lips move.

"Do you have any idea how much you arouse me when you speak? I could have you read the most boring text to me and I would be unable to contain myself," she admitted. With an embarrassed titter, she lifted her head to look at him. "Had you been one of the Senior Enchanters, I would have been rapt listening to my lessons, for all those long years of study." She laughed in earnest then. "I wouldn't have learned anything, but I would have been paying very careful attention."

He replied only with a raised eyebrow and a quirk of his lips.

"I imagine I would have become quiet adept at touching myself under the table however, which is a very special and important skill to learn, don't you think?" she continued.

Loghain took a sharp breath, squeezing his eyes shut and grabbing at her waist. He pulled her down against him. The thick ridge of his erection pressed up against her as she rolled her hips slightly.

"Apparently, it is not just the words  _you_  speak that are powerful, no?"

"You are a witch," he replied. "You cast a spell on me."

"Only if your hair is on fire," she snorted. She wriggled her bottom. "You DO feel a bit warm."

Abruptly, he grabbed her and rolled her over, simultaneously shifting her up on the bed and flipping the hem of her nightgown up to her waist. He made a show of inspecting her, running his thumb along the inside of her thigh, then pressing it against the heart of her growing arousal.

"You seem a bit feverish yourself," he quipped, pushing with a bit more pressure, before moving his thumb in the slow circle.

It took all her restraint to not buck up off the bed. Loghain looked pleased with himself.

"You enjoy making me lose control, don't you?" she panted at him breathlessly.

"More than you realize," he said quickly, a shadow flicking in his eyes for a moment. He seemed to push that particular shadow away quickly, before seeing to the laces on his breeches. Adrian reached up and tugged at the hem of his jerkin.

"This too," she said. "As much as I like the idea of leather, I like the touch of your skin more."

He gracefully unlatched the buckles wrapping it closed at his side, shrugging off the offending garment. "As my lady commands," he said, swiftly finishing with the laces and shimmying the tight leather over his hips and managing to wiggle out a single leg. He hooked his hands behind her knees, pulling her body up to meet him. He slid inside her, just as practiced as he was with her landscape.

For a moment, it was new. It always was. He was so much bigger than she was, despite his slim hips and taut body and hers soft and round. She felt his pulse in his cock, and she clenched tightly, holding him.

"Maker, Adrian," he muttered, "I just, I..." He drifted off, not finishing his sentence as he buried his face in her neck again. His hips began a languorous but steady rhythm against her.

She surrendered against him and to him, wrapping her arms around his broad back, utterly enveloped by him.

Loghain was everywhere; she couldn't deny him anything. He was as fragile and sensitive as any person she'd ever known under his hard, cold veneer but once he'd opened up to her, his presence was overwhelming as the scent of incense in the temple. Yet it was not at all the suffocating experience she expected. It was like being wrapped in a fur, secure and completely embraced by warmth and utter contentment.

_No, it couldn't be._

"Oh Maker," he said again, his rhythm faltering and then speeding. Their voices and breath intermingled into the particular song all who heard it would understand.

She felt him tense and slow. Loghain took a deep breath and blew it out between his teeth. He was trying to hold back; to please her, to take the time to make her feel whatever he could wrench from her.

_Not this time_  her body immediately insisted. It knew what it wanted, her hips pushing up against him, moving when he did not.

"If you don't stop...I...," he managed.

"Yes," she panted. "Please."

He didn't move but let her work him, raised up just enough that she could maneuver herself against him, around him.

Adrian felt it happen, the first sparks of his spine unraveling, finally pressing down hard inside her, pulsing and throbbing until he shouted and shuddered against her.

She didn't let him go, instead guided him down against her, his head buried in her hair and the still frantic thudding of his heart in his chest comfortingly pressed against hers. She reveled in that particular sticky feeling of his sweat damp flesh. She ran her fingers along the now familiar scars on his back tracing the lines of each one. She'd asked him what battle they were from and the names rattled through her brain like a litany.  _West Hill, River Dane, Denerim_.

She knew them all by heart.

She knew Loghain by heart too, even though she's tried like the Black City not to.

"Maker's breath," he whispered for a third time. "I can't believe how much I love you."

And Adrian already knew, but her heart broke a little bit when he said it. She wanted to say the same; she wanted to, but the words just wouldn't come. She  _couldn't._

Instead, she just heard herself whimper and clung to him even more fiercely.

"I know," he replied to her wordless admission. "I know."


	8. A Taste of Bitter Freedom

When Loghain woke, it was still night. It was dark as pitch out the window with that perfect silence that only happens in the deepest part of the dark, like the entire world was asleep except for him.  The candles were burnt down to stubs, but still lit the room in a pale flickering light. He watched the flame dance for a little bit, trying to find his bearings.

He had a sudden feeling of dread.  _Maker, what had he done?_  Words, said in a moment of passion and...he sighed, irritated at himself. _Sod it all_  but it wasn't as if he didn't mean them. He did love Adrian, despite all his intentions to the contrary.  And even worse he'd blurted it out like a love struck teenage boy.

This wasn't supposed to be about love.

They were in the middle of a war; a war with four sides and Maker knew how many factions. At any moment, they could be swept out on to the battlefield and there was no way to know what side they'd each be on. Loghain didn't want to fight against the mages, but he was first a Grey Warden before anything else.  The longer it took for the messenger to arrive from Weisshaupt, the more he was certain that they would not choose a side, maybe not even at the bitter end.  The Wardens had enough problems of their own, more and more succumbing to the Calling every day and when it happened, getting a secret missive that sent them somewhere other than the Deep Roads.

There were whispers. There were hints and something dark and terrible taking root in the Wardens. He felt it in himself as the song gained in strength. The Wardens were scared and whatever Clarel was going, he knew it was related. There was corruption growing here and he was still unsure where it was leading.

He wasn't sure he had it in him to defect from the Wardens, even as they fell to pieces. Being a Grey Warden was something Kya gave him.  It was the only thing he really had left from her and he'd let being a Grey Warden take her from him. After all he'd given up in the name of this duty he wasn't sure it was something he could abandon and live with himself.

Loghain untangled himself from Adrian, trying his best to not disturb her sleep. His head throbbed. He swung his legs over the side of the bed, leaning his elbows on this thighs and his face in his hands.

He should go now, before it got any worse than it already was. Perhaps, if he stole away before she woke, he could...

"Loghain?" his thoughts were cut short by Adrian's sleep muddled voice, the palm of her warm hand on the small of his back. "Is everything alright?"

He sat up carefully. "No, I don't believe it is."

"Nightmares again?" she asked, honest concern overcoming her fatigue. She had a sweet side. He knew not many got the chance to see it.

He considered for a moment. She knew full well about Grey Warden nightmares, having spent all this time with him. He could just allow that to be his excuse and curl back up against her, sparing her heart and his for another night. And it wasn't as if it wasn't true. He had nightmares nearly every night now, even with Adrian there to comfort him. But that cold practical part of him, it just wouldn't be denied.

"No, not this time," he said, voice measured and cool. "I think I need to go."

"Go where?" she asked. He felt her sit up, but didn't turn around to look. "It's the middle of the night."

"And it is far later than I should be here," he said. He grabbed his trousers where he'd discarded them in a ball at the foot of the bed, sliding his legs in and pulling them up over his hips. He fiddled with the laces, tying them tighter than was strictly comfortable.

Loghain heard Adrian sit and slide across the bed toward him. He glanced back, finding her carefully wrapped in the sheet, red curls askew around her face. She looked so much younger than her years and far more innocent than he knew she was. He looked away. He couldn't lose his resolve.

"What are you on about? Where could you possibly need to be?" she asked, irritation slipping into her tone.

"Oh, I am certain you know," he snapped. He could almost hear her brow furrowing. "We are at war, lady, and the war gets closer everyday as does inevitable word from Weisshaupt. As much a I...," his voice cracked. He cleared his throat. "As much as I've come to care for you, it benefits neither of us to let this go on any further."

"What?" Adrian's voice was sharp with confusion as she scrambled out of the bed, small bare feet slapping against the cold floor and the length of the sheet stretched out behind her like a train on a long white dress. "Why does this suddenly matter now? We've been at war since the day we met. Nothing has changed."

Loghain sighed. "We changed," he said. "You know as well as I that  _this_  wasn't supposed to get to this point."

"Oh, I see," she said flippantly. "I should hardly be surprised."  She looked down for a moment, pursing her lips. She looked back at him, carefully meeting his eyes. "But I still don't see what difference it makes, unless walking out of this room is going to change it."

"Tomorrow," he said, turning his back to her again and slipping his arms into his shirt. "Tomorrow or the day after that, war is going to come to Montsimmard. Word may come in reply from the First Warden and it may put us on opposite sides of the battlefield."

"So what about everything you've said?" Adrian's face was flushed. "It's  _to the Fade_  with everything you said about mages deserving to be free and to the Black City with me and with your supposed beloved Hero of Ferelden?"

That one stung.

"What would you have me do?" Loghain asked through clenched teeth.

"Well, you could start by stopping being a flaming coward," she groused.  

Loghain spun around. She knew just where to scratch to cause him pain and her claws were sharp.

"I have never backed down from any duty in my life; and I am no coward," he growled.

"You aren't afraid of defying the Warden-Constable then if he tells you to take my head as a trophy?" she spat at him. "You are just going to stand there and tell me you would kill me for fighting to be free? You, the man who saved your homeland and gave up everything for its freedom? Instead of following your convictions you are now willing to listen to orders from some far flung outposts that doesn't know fuck all about what's happening her even if those orders tell you to kill a woman you claim to _love?"_

Her words were arrows, aiming for his heart. But they did not have the effect she was clearly expecting. Instead of understanding, instead of reconsideration, they inflamed his anger. Loghain resisted to urge to charge at her, balling his hands into fists hard enough that his short nails bit into his palms.

"I made sure my best friend executed the woman he loved, because she deserved to die," he said, his voice slow and deadly. He saw Maric's broken face and Katriel's dead eyes in his head.  His heart was a lead weight in his chest.  "What makes you think I wouldn't do the same, to an  _Orlesian whore_?"

Adrian looked like she'd been slapped, blood flushing her skin from her hairline to where the white sheet covered her.

"Get. Out," she snapped, clutching the sheet with one white knuckled hand, pointing at the door with the other. "Get out before I do something you'll regret."

Without a word, Loghain scooped his boots up off the floor and headed to the door. He paused for a moment before opening it.

"I am sorry," he said without turning around. "But we both knew this was a bad idea from the start."

He slipped through the door and closed it behind him. Once the latch closed, he heard her shriek and then the unmistakable sound of a fireball hitting the door. A waft of smoke curled out from under the door.

"Maker," he muttered under his breath.

He wanted to be angry at her. He'd almost reveled in the argument, hoping that it would be enough to change the way he felt and maybe he'd be lucky enough to channel that anger into the fight he knew was coming. But it was empty. He knew her words were just thrown as weapons, not as truth.   _Andraste's tits..._ he'd called her a whore, the very thing he'd railed against from the very start when it was supposed to just be about sex. Loghain knew he hurt her, his little firebrand who'd never felt like she was worthy of love before.  

She'd been his, at least for a little while and she was most worthy of love, flaws and all. But Loghain needed to walk away.  He wasn't the man to give her the love she deserved; he was just a broken down old Grey Warden who knew there were things coming on the horizon that threatened to swallow them all.  No different from being with Kya and then letting her go, didn't Adrian deserve someone who wasn't this close to death and this... _broken_?

He heard another sound through the door that sounded too close to a sob. Loghain fled like a mabari pup with his tail between his legs.

As he walked away, out into the cool night air, he realized felt normal in a way he hadn't since he'd first met her in the tavern that night. It was a sick sort of normal that consisted of a dull ache in his chest and an empty pit in his stomach.  And worse, it was almost as if he liked to feel this pain, this horrible ache between his ribs. It was like broken down old boots that didn't fit. It was like an old enemy, one you know so well he's nearly a friend.

It was no more than he deserved.

* * *

Adrian wasn't sure what just happened, but she was sure she hated it.

There was a scorch mark on the door and an empty spot on her bed and she was so angry she could hardly think straight. He fucked her.  He told her he loved her.  And somehow this turned into a  threat to kill her and calling her a whore? She was beyond words.

Maker did it  _hurt_.

She sat down hard on the bed and heard a strange strangled sound. It took a moment before she realized it was her own voice. She swallowed it back into silence.

All she could do was sit there, staring blankly at the wall, clutching the sheet around her chest.  It felt like if she let go her chest would just fall open and there'd be a giant gaping hole where her heart used to be. It was hard to breathe.

All her life she'd guarded herself against this. Rhys was as close as a man had ever gotten and that wasn't nearly close as anyone thought. She never told him her secrets, her thoughts, her ambitions. He'd never told her his either. It hurt her at the time, but not like this.

This was different, because Loghain's sweat was barely dry on her skin and she could still hear his words echoing in her head.

_I can't believe how much I love you._

How dare he? How could he do this to her? No one had ever loved her, though Rhys had claimed to, once or twice. Her own parents hadn't loved her enough to hide her from the Templars. Before Loghain, all Adrian ever loved was the idea of being free.

If she'd had the strength, she would have lobbed another fireball at the door, but there was nothing left inside her. It was like her mana had been cored out, along with her heart.

All that was left was the fight, the fight for her freedom that had driven her for as long as she could remember.

Freedom....  The worst part of all of this was that the freedom she used to dream of felt like  _this_  had felt, these last few months. All along, it was being wanted, of being good enough, of being just a regular woman that was the freedom she truly desired.

Whatever happened when she fought her way through the Templars and the Seekers and the Chantry, she knew now that it wouldn't feel like this. Even if they all suddenly looked up to her and she became some hero, like the Hero of Ferelden, or that Grey Warden apostate who destroyed the Chantry, even then, it wasn't going to be enough.  The freedom she was willing to die for even now would be just as empty as the life before it had been, now that she knew the difference.

Adrian curled up into a ball on the bed and sobbed helplessly, unable to stop herself.  In between, she thanked the Maker there was no one there to see her.


	9. The Line is Drawn

Loghain briefly considered going back to the Warden compound and trying to sleep at least until dawn, but he knew it was a pointless exercise. He'd never needed much sleep anyway, so there was no point in struggling himself into unconsciousness just to be awakened by nightmares.

It was hard to say whether those dreams would be of darkspawn or of broken hearts, but neither was something he wanted to experience.

He went instead to the lakeshore, hoping the brisk, damp air might clear his head. It was painful, this, but he had to be the one willing to be strong. He remembered that night so long ago, when he sent Rowan to Maric, knowing that she would never be his again. Though there have been many of those in power who've lead secret lives apart from the face they showed the world he knew he would never have been able to keep up such a farce. His own daughter's marriage, at least the first one, had been much like that...Cailan was always carrying on with other women. But Loghain knew that neither he nor Rowan would be able to keep what they felt for each other separate from what they felt for Maric, so the only thing to do was to let them go, if more for Maric's sake than their own. Though Loghain was never one for thinking with his heart, he was easily hurt. He knew it was a balancing act they could only fail.

So he let her go. He let them all go eventually because that was how the world worked. Nothing was permanent, no matter how one railed against it. Wasn't it better to not deny the inevitable? Wasn't it better to walk away before it got any worse?

Sweet Andraste, he hoped he was right.

As dawn finally lit the sky, he returned to the compound and threw himself back into training. By the end of the day, those poor sodding noble bastards were drenched in sweat and hardly fit to be alive. They'd be cursing his name for a year, after what he put them through. Any still able to walk in the morning were going to get the same treatment all over again tomorrow.

The other Wardens, as always, gave Loghain a wide berth. He had no interest in commiserating with them, though he knew they were talking. He'd made no secret of his time with Adrian and he was sure the gossiping fishwives were happy now with something to talk about to distract them for all their other, darker concerns.

Loghain walked through nearly a week like that, sleepwalking through his life such as it was and ignoring the hollow ache in his chest. He focused on fighting the song of the Calling in his head, but that focus only served to make things worse. It was Adrian who'd given him the comfort and the strength that had been holding it back. He wanted to ferret out what was going on before he admitted it to anyone, but he knew he'd have to give in to it, sooner or later. He no longer wondered if he was an idiot; he knew he was. But that didn't change the fact that he'd done the right thing by letting Adrian go. He was sure she didn't agree, but much better for her to hate him than pine for him when they were inevitably separated. They had both agreed they did not want complications. He'd foolishly gone and gotten attached - it was his duty to make it right again.

That didn't make him feel any better.

He'd utterly convinced himself that he'd made both the right and wrong decision when Warden Constable Bernard called for him.

"Warden Loghain," the useless waste of skin greeted him, lounging in his chair like an over fed cat. "We have received an answer from Weisshaupt for your little Mage."

Loghain clenched his teeth together but did not reply.

"I am sure you are not surprised that the First Warden has no interest in antagonizing the Chantry or the rogue Templars and has denied the  _First Enchanter's_  request for Grey Warden aid." He said her title with equal amounts disdain and sarcasm.

"I am not surprised," Loghain replied coldly. "Though your perverse pleasure in denying her seems inappropriate."

The man smiled at him with too many teeth. "I don't care about her. I am glad to deny _you,_ Monsieur, anything that might please you in any way. And we all know how her joy would please you from the screaming from your apartments." Bernard's distaste was evident as leaned forward and put his elbows on his desk. "My father was a Chevalier, you see. He was sent to Ferelden when I was just a pup and he was slaughtered at the Battle of River Dane." He laid his hands on the desktop, palms down. "So you see, Warden Loghain, it is you I enjoy displeasing, not your little slut of a mage."

Loghain felt a vein pulse in his temple, anger surging. He leaned forward menacingly and to the void with the chain of command. He slammed his hands on the desk. "I only regret I couldn't kill your father before he left his dried spunk on your mother's leg. Or perhaps we'd all be better off if he'd fucked her in the ass, though if he had I suppose you'd still be here, little shit that you are."

Bernard leapt to his feet. "If I...you...get out." He stammered in his frustration.

Instead of walking out, Loghain folded his arms across his chest. Bernard was short, though broad enough through the chest to legitimately be called a Grey Warden , yet Loghain easily towered down at him.

They stared at each other for a few increasingly tense moments before Bernard folded and sat down. He waved his hand at Loghain.

"Fine, I don't care. Scowl and threaten all you like. It doesn't change anything," Bernard said, leaning back in his chair but with far less ease than before.

He might be able to cow Bernard, but he  _was_  right. Loghain's anger wouldn't change anything. He had no allies here, not yet, though that was something he knew now that needed to change. As much as it irked him, it was time to call on his reputation for both heroics and treachery because men flocked to both. This worm didn't deserve his power and Loghain felt no desire to all it to continue. But it couldn't change today. Today, Bernard's word and the messenger's word were the law. The Wardens wouldn't help the mages.

Accepting temporary defeat, Loghain retreated. He knew the value of a calculated falling back. It would be Bernard who regretted this battle in time.

For now, all he could do was tell Adrian the news and offer her his promise that he would see things change. He wasn't going to give up on the Wardens or on her, no matter what he thought in the throws of his own earlier selfishness. Perhaps he couldn't get the Wardens to fight alongside the mages, but he could prevent then from fighting against them. There were darker things at work. If he could find out the heart of those, the Wardens would be too distracted, at least, to offer resistance. 

Loghain drew a line. He intended to defend it.

He left the compound with a mission, determined to make things right one way or the other. If Bernard only knew what his cajoling had done, he'd probably take it back but Loghain watched his own reaction to that pig's words and knew the truth. He wouldn't fight against Adrian or the mages. How could he have imagined he could, after all that had happened?

He would change the Grey Wardens if he had to. It would be easier than changing his own mind; a lifetime of stubborn, bull-headed, mabari like behavior stretched out behind him drove that point home.

His steps were long and confident for the first time since he left Adrian. He expected her wrath and knew he deserved it, it was something he was willing to face especially now that he'd stopped being a sniveling coward. He knew the truth of the matter. He was the man who'd ruled Ferelden in all but name for decades and groomed his daughter to rule after him. He was Loghain Mac Tir, the former Teyrn of Gwaren, the Hero of River Dane and the companion of the brave and beautiful hero of Ferelden. How could he have let himself be turned away from what he wanted, yet again, by insecurity and weakness?

Not this time.

He saw her on the approach to the tower, her bright hair a tiny ginger colored blot against the grey stones. She was motionless and he almost imagined her standing there, arms crossed over her chest ready and willing to give with a fiery dressing down that he most certainly had earned. He had plans in his mind to stop her anger. Plans that included needing her help, and the deviousness of her mind to help him turn the bulk of the Wardens to their cause. Not just her cause,  _their cause._

There was nothing that aroused Loghain more than knowing where he stood; knowing what was the side of righteousness and which was that of callowness. He had fought many battles in his life, some more valiantly than others. But, when he'd truly deigned to take the battle to the field, eventually he always succeeded. Even where he failed against Kya, he'd won the war, kept his daughter on her throne and ended the Blight by her side.

Loghain was exhilarated and could not wait to see Adrian standing there, proud and haughty and ready for a battle of their own.

But Adrian wasn't standing, she was sitting with her head hanging low and her elbows on her knees, hands held prone out before her. When he got close enough, he realized her hands were covered in blood.


	10. Blood and Mistakes

Adrian always wanted to be on the battlefield. Her whole life she'd dreamt about it; the exhilaration, the fury, and even the bloodshed. That poor Tranquil was the only person she'd actually ever killed -  _undead, demons, darkspawn; they didn't count_  - and though she hadn't enjoyed it, the rush of knowing that what she did was right and moral and fed her ambitions had been addictive. How much more glorious would a battle be?

But what she saw in the infirmary wasn't glorious or righteous or exhilarating. The room stunk of blood and shit and death.

The messenger did his best at being a scout, but he was a mage not a rogue. Formerly of the Circle at Kirkwall and one of very few who'd survived the attack by the Templars, Enchanter Marco was a lovely young man with an Antivan name and a Marcher accent. His blood was on Adrian's hands, both literally and figuratively.

He'd come with a missive from Divine Justinia of the Chantry. She wished to end the bloodshed, end the war and wanted to talk peace. Perhaps it was ironic, but they'd chose the Temple of Sacred Ashes in Ferelden as their meeting place, where the  _mage_  Hero Kya Amell found Andraste's urn. It was an interesting dichotomy of symbolism.

And so Marco brought the news across Orlais, through battles of magic and swords and civil war that had nothing to do with them, because apparently some bastard Grand Duke thought this would be an excellent time to throw a coup. Not that Adrian particularly cared who was in power, as long as they sided with her and since neither Celene or this Gaspard were likely to do so, it was between the mages and the Chantry and today...today between her and Marco who'd died while mages cast spell after spell and Adrian herself held his bloody and battered hands with her own.

It hadn't been enough.

He'd died, sacrificed himself to get this message to her. What was worse was that he'd been set upon by  _mages_  not Templars. Maker forsaken  _mages_  that hated the idea of peace as much as they hated the Circle. It had gone so far beyond the fight for freedom. They wanted to burn the world down. They were going to ruin everything and kill everyone. Adrian felt the guilt of it all crushing down on her like the weight of the entire world. All she could do was sit there, sucking in air and trying to flush the scent of death out of her lungs, staring dumbly at her blood stained hands.

She heard Loghain's footsteps and recognized him immediately. She'd gotten used to the particular cadence of his steps and the way the he moved. She knew it was him without looking up. She couldn't bear to look at him anyways. There was likely to be nothing on his face she wanted to see. The last time she saw him, his face was cold as the grave and closed to her, as if they'd never known each other at all. Yet only hours before he'd confessed to loving her. The two sides of his face were sharp as a blade.

"You were right," she muttered once when he was in earshot, not even knowing why she'd admit it but feeling the uncontrollable need to do it even so. "And I need to try to stop it before it's too late. I'm sorry I tried to drag you into this with me."

Loghain crouched down in front of her, putting his hands under hers.

"Whose blood is this?" His voice was carefully measured as if she was a horse that might bolt. Adrian wasn't certain that she wouldn't.

"A messenger. The Divine...has called for a peace conference and...and on the way,  _mages_  attacked him." Adrian looked up at him. She knew her eyes were bloodshot. They burned. At the moment, she didn't much care. What could he do? Leave her again? Leave more? His face was expressionless though his eyes were dark. "They don't even care about freedom, they just don't care about anything except finding someone to take out their anger on." Adrian shuddered. She knew anger, she understood it. But anger needed to be a tool, not an inferno. "What have I done?" She wasn't sure if she was asking Loghain or herself.

Loghain's hands closed around hers, ignoring the blood. He didn't say anything for a little but after a few beats, he let go and came around to sit next to her on the step.

"War never goes as planned, First Enchanter," he said. "All you can do is adapt. Are you...," he paused and it seemed as if he was looking for his next words. "Are you going to meet with them?"

"It's probably a trap," Adrian said, her eyes on her stained hands. "But I have to go. I can't let this go on if it doesn't have to and Fiona is too important to the cause to go herself. If not me, then who?"

"You do know it's as likely you won't even survive to get there," he said, his tone making it sound as if he assumed she did know.

Adrian grunted. "I know, but I can't just sit here and pretend I'm part of this  _Circle_  when I've rebelled against them, when those I brought with me, we're just squatters. I've been hiding while my fellow mages are  _dying._ The actual First Enchanter of this supposedly loyal Circle is going to come back and remove me forcibly with a tide of ice and harsh language. Or so word from Halamshiral says." Adrian shook her head. "I can't pretend that this detour accomplished anything. Everything is a mess and it's not getting any better." Adrian took a deep breath. "I started this." She turned to look at him, pulling her shoulders back with faked bravado. "I will finish it."

Loghain nodded, his face still stoic and neutral. "I understand. And I'm going to do the same." He made a strangled sound. "The Wardens are corrupt. They are a shadow of what they stand for and there are things...," He paused, swallowing a secret. "I'm not going to let this continue. I fear there are issues I must deal with first, but somehow I will support your bid for freedom, even if its starts in peace instead of war."

Adrian furrowed her brow. "What do you mean?"

"I mean that I won't fight you, no matter on what battlefield. I don't know how I thought that I would." Loghain's face softened as he tentatively put his hand on hers where it lay motionless on her knee. "Your  _detour,_ as you put it," he said, a sad version of a smile on his lips. "It did accomplish something, and not just getting the support of a senior Warden. It gave this particular Warden a reason to keep fighting the good fight." He squeezed her hand. "I am sorry I wasted what time we had."

"It's hard to change your ways," Adrian sighed, her heart leaping to attention. "I know better than most." She put her free hand over his. "Wasted time and foolishness or not, I wouldn't trade the time we did have for anything, even if it's over."

_And it was over, wasn't it? It was over before it even began truly._

"I don't think I was ever suited for happiness."

Adrian's face smiled against her better judgment. "Me neither, but it was lovely to try it on. Sort of like a fancy hat at the market." She looked up at him. "I would never own a hat, but it looked lovely while I wore it."

Loghain smirked. "That's a ridiculous metaphor."

He made her laugh. It felt good to laugh.

"It is, but it is the best I could do without planning. After all, I didn't expect I would see you again," she smiled at him trying to maintain that momentary relief, but the pain in her chest tugged the corners of her mouth down again. She looked down at her hand over his, the blood turning dark as it dried tight on her skin.

"When do you leave?" His voice caught a little at the end and Adrian looked up at him. His voice was usually so measured and calm but that little hitch betrayed him.

Adrian met cool blue eyes. "In a..." His brows were drawn down and he looked so sad. She struggled to continue. "...few days." She shook her head, trying to resist the urge to comfort him and herself. "There's a lot of do to get ready."

Loghain brightened a little. "A few days then," he said. "If there's any way you'd consider forgiving me for being an utterly horrific excuse for a human being, I'd like to see if you and I..." He trailed off and shook his head. "I'm useless at this sort of thing, but I..." He hmphed, frustrated with himself.

That was what finally made Adrian smile fully. Whatever else he might be, he was still just a man who was as clueless and overwhelmed by his emotions as she was.

"I do forgive you,  _I already had_ , though only the Maker knows why," she said softly. Her heart still ached, but his presence made it a bit more bearable. "I was only sad, to be honest. I gave up on the idea of...," she fought against the part of her that didn't want to admit it and didn't want to say it. Yet it needed to be said. Loghain told her the truth, though it hurt him enough to drive him away. She owed him her own admission. "I gave up on  _love_  when Rhys didn't love me back. I should have told you, maybe then you wouldn't have..." Adrian breathed out slowly through her nose, trying to keep herself in check. There were all these enormous feelings swirling around her. She wasn't sure she was big enough to contain them all. "I never expected any of this and I didn't even expect you to stay as long as you did, but I'm glad you're here now."

It was so hard, admitting her feelings.

Loghain's entire body seemed to relax at that, the weight of his shoulder leaning against her increasing a little. Adrian closed her eyes and leaned her head against him. It was such an unbelievable comfort having him here with her. Broken as they both were, it was as if they managed to hold each other together so they weren't always in danger of blowing apart.

Adrian didn't know if this that was how normal people loved each other, but she suspected it wasn't.

They sat in silence for a moment, just the sound of their breathing, just the warmth of two bodies leaning against each other. Loghain shifted himself, reached around to turn Adrian's face toward him. Her heart pattered in her chest. With a small noise, he leaned in and kissed her.

They were better at this, especially now that they'd gotten so familiar with each other. Touch was always more honest than their words. Adrian reveled in the warm brush of his stubble against her face and the way his fingers tightened around her upper arm. The languid brush of his tongue across hers sent a flutter through her from the center of her chest radiating through her entire body.

There was still blood on her hands, but wasn't there always? Stories made it seem like love should only have happy endings and that the heroes would get to save everyone important. But life was rarely like stories. Life was dirty and broken and flawed and  _Maker_  she loved him.

She pulled away enough to speak, her forehead against his.

"Thank you," she whispered, swallowing hard and trying to hold back threatening tears. " _Oh Maker_ , thank you."

She actually felt his brow furrow. "For what?"

"For letting me experience love, for real this time," she managed, heart pounding in her chest. It was hard to breathe. She lifted her head to look at him and managed to put on a smile.

A smile ghosted the corner of Loghain's mouth. "Thank you for teaching me I still could love. I was certain there was no more left for me. I'm glad I was wrong."

"A few days then," Adrian said, nuzzling her cheek against his.

"A few more beautiful days." He seemed like he really meant it.


	11. Firelight

Loghain woke because he was too warm.  

The fire was blazing, flickering light through the entire small room.  He expected to find himself tangled in Adrian, but he was alone in her bed, the sheets twisted around his legs, damp with sweat.  He sat up and saw her, crouched in front of the fire in just the thin slip she wore under her robes, dropping sheets of parchment into the flames.  Sometimes, in between pages, she was flicking little licks of magical flame from her fingertips, as if she couldn't wait for the paper to burn on its own in the coals.  

Her skin was pale under the orange glow of the flames, her mouth set in a tight, straight line.  Usually, she looked younger than he knew she was, but at the moment, she looked inexplicably old, the brilliant glow of the fire enhancing each line, each furrow in her face.

"What are you doing?" he couldn't help but ask.  She started a bit at the sound of his voice but didn't look up.

"I'm burning garbage," she said, voice drawn and small.  "I burned that fucking manifesto first, every blasted page."

Loghain raised an eyebrow.  "I thought you agreed with it."

"I do, I  _did_ ," she said.  She shook her head and dropped the pile of papers she was holding.  They splayed out on the floor at her feet.  "But look where that got us?  Mages aren't free.  They are just running around killing people and being killed and making everyone hate us even more.  What did this accomplish, except death?"

He swung his legs out of the bed, dragging half the linens with him.  Loghain untangled himself from them, leaving them in a heap on the floor.  He wasn't dressed, but didn't bother, just padding over on bare feet.  He sat down on the rug next to her, folding his legs in front of him, heedless of his nudity.

"It's not over yet," he said, leaning his elbows on his knees.  "This conclave business, this is what it accomplished.  Do you think the Divine would have been willing to talk without it?"

Adrian seemed to ponder that for a moment.  She looked over at him, her face strained.  "Probably not."

"War is terrible," he said.  "But sometimes it is necessary.  And when it happens, there will always be those people who pervert it to their own ends."

Adrian picked up another sheet of paper, this one creased in two spots as if it had been folded into an envelope.  Loghain could see the broken piece of a wax seal on one side. She looked at the writing, the lines around her mouth deepening into her frown.

"What's that one?" he asked.

"A letter, " she said.  Her tone was acidic.  "From Rhys telling me he was leaving.  Leaving the Aequitatians, the remnants of the Circle, the rebellion.  It's a letter telling me to go fuck myself." She grunted. "He came to Montsimmard with me at Fiona's request, supposedly to keep researching the Rite of Tranquility, with his lovely safety net Templar at his side.  I used to listen to them, couldn't help but hear it.  They had the room right next door.  One day, a few days after I met you in fact, I found this under the door and their room abandoned.  He said he couldn't be 'part of this travesty any more.'  All in lovely gracious language, of course."

Loghain couldn't think of a suitable reply, so he stayed silent.  Rhys was a sore spot, no matter what Adrian claimed.  She didn't love him, not any more, but the idea that he might never loved have her itched at her.  He knew how that felt.

"He was right.  He was always right, about this and me and everything.  This  _is_  a travesty; it's an abomination as surely as anything else."  She jerked her wrist and the paper flew into the fire, the edges blackening as the embers consumed it.  Flame rose from the parchment and the light flickered over them both.

"I'm positive he wasn't right about a lot of things," Loghain said, knowing everyone was a fool in their own way.  The Rhys person was clearly blind to Adrian's fire, or too weak to withstand it.

"No, I think he was right, about a lot of ...." She got a strange look on her face, as if she was trying very hard to remember something.  "There were murders.  In the White Spire. I remember ... I don't know.  It's strange.  It's like part of my memory is missing."

Loghain chuckled.  "Old age will do that to you."

Adrian cracked a small smile and swatted at him.  "I'm not old."

"No, you aren't," he said, and frowned.  She wasn't old, at all, not even forty yet.  "Please be careful, at the conclave.  I want you to get old."

She looked over at him, half her face violet with shadows. She looked at him carefully before she spoke. "You really mean that, don't you?" 

"Of course." He shook his head.   _Of course_   _he meant it.  He loved her._

"It's strange," she said.  Her voice dropped low.  "I never really cared what happened to me before, as long as I went out trying to make things better for mages.  Yet, most of that time, I was protected in all directions, even from myself." She sighed again. "Now, when I think I might like to stay alive, now there's actual danger everywhere."

"Life is like that," Loghain agreed.  

She leaned against him, her curls tickling his arm.  "Thank you for coming back."

"Thank you for letting me come back," he said. "I'm frequently idiotic when it comes to these things."

Adrian laughed a little and set her hand on his thigh.  Her fingers flexed against skin and she sat down, scooting herself closer.  Her brow furrowed again, though this time with a grin.

"Are you naked?" she asked, apparently not noticing before in her distraction.

"Just as you left me," he chuckled.

"Then why I am I sitting here grousing about manifestos and letters and bullshit, instead of taking advantage of you?" She laughed as she spoke, her early dark tone evaporating.

"The Maker himself couldn't answer that." 

She replied by turning her face up to look at him.  The firelight was dimmer now, but it still glinted in her eyes.  They were green, with blue rings and yellow flecks.  He knew them as intimately as he could.  He was reminded of that first night when he couldn't recall their color and when he thought this would just be a causal fling, a moment of physical comfort.  He'd been so wrong.

"Kiss me," Adrian asked softly.  "Please love."

And he did.  Loghain kissed her as if it was the last time he would ever touch her.  There was always a chance it would be now, as their time here drew so close to ending.  He prayed, and he rarely prayed, but he prayed that somehow they would both come out of this alive.  He kissed her, feeling the soft brush of her breath, the smoothness of her skin.  Her arms came up around him, warm little fingers digging into this shoulders.  He wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her closer, tugging her around and up on to his lap.  He wanted her as close as she would let him.  He needed her as close as she could be.  His heartbeat sped frantically in this chest.

Adrian wriggled her hips, that little slip bunching up around her waist.  "I wish we could just stay here forever," she whispered against his mouth.  Loghain shifted them both, kicking his long legs out and leaning back, feeling the sweet touch of her body against him.  She moved her hips again, rocked forward.  Then, slowly, inching back, dragging moist heat over him.  He felt his fingers clutch at her.

She pushed on his shoulders to lay back, and he complied, happy to let her do what she would.  He just wanted her here.  He didn't even care how, as long as she didn't go.  Not yet.

Adrian reached down between them as she raised herself up.  Her fingers wrapped around him, angling him until she could slide back and take him inside of her.  Loghain closed his eyes to focus on the sensation.  Familiar as making love to Adrian was, he wasn't sure he'd ever get used to the overwhelming feeling of it, of being desired, of being with someone who wanted every little broken part of him.

He opened his eyes to watch her.  Her head fell back, the firelight glowing through her red curls, haloing them in a ring of bittersweet orange and gold.  She moved, and he watched and was mesmerized by her.  She was so intent, so passionately invested in everything she did, and held nothing back now that she no longer feared that he'd reject her.

Though he had, for at time, for his own foolish reasons.  

He put his hands oh her hips, but let her set the pace, just hung on.  She leaned forward, her hair swinging down like a curtain around them as she came closer to kiss him again, still rocking against him.  He pushed his hips up against her, hearing the broken sound of his own voice as she clung to him.

She might have said she loved him.  She might have been silent.  He wasn't sure, over the rush of his blood in his ears and the haunting strains of The Calling song that had started again.  But it didn't matter.  He knew she loved him, by every touch, by the feeling of her skin under his hands and her mouth on his.  She loved him and he loved her in return and that would have to be enough.

  

 

 

 


	12. Not Goodbye

Adrian woke to the distinctive sound of hair being cut.  It made a  _snick_  sound, the little twang of a sharp blade and then a crackle when the hair hit the coals in the fireplace.  There were only dark embers now and a pale grey light came into the room from behind the curtains.

Loghain had carried her to the bed after they made love on the floor in front of fireplace and she'd fallen asleep to him propped up on an elbow beside her, twirling her curls around his fingers and occasionally brushing her cheeks with his knuckles.  It had felt so comforting; his warmth, the soft, distracted look on his face from the lack of tension around his eyes and the little twitch of a grin on the corner of his mouth. 

He made her feel safe, and she knew there wouldn't be much safety in the coming days, so she soaked in his attentions like a sponge.  She hadn't intended to go to sleep, it had just stolen over her, much as he expected, she assumed.  She peeped an eye open now but didn't move, just watching him as he sat on a chair in from of the fire, cutting the length of his hair.  It had gotten long, falling down over his shoulders, his wind braids brushing his collarbones.  He was cutting at the back of his neck by touch, deftly trimming as if he'd done it dozens of times before.  He looked a bit haggard, dark circles under his eyes.  He hadn't gotten any more sleep.

It reminded her uncomfortably of what was to come.  She sat up and wrapped the sheet around herself, sliding out of the bed.  She didn't bother trying to be quiet.  He always heard her.  She watched over to him and he looked up, giving her a sad smile.

"I know you've said you like it," he said, almost apologetically, "but all this hair won't be convenient for traveling or battle."  He cut through the remaining hair on his neck, leaving just his long braids swinging.  He grabbed one and pondered it for a moment.  He made an irritated sound.

"I never thought it would bother me to cut my hair," he groused.  "Foolishness."

Adrian put her fingers over his and he closed his eyes.

"Do you want me to do it?" she asked him.  He looked so different already, so far away, but she wanted to hold on as long as she could.

He nodded wordlessly.  Adrian took the dagger from his other hand.  The blade was simple and notched in many places, but had been recently sharpened.  It wasn't a decorative blade, just plain, discolored steel.  The grip was wrapped in deerskin, sweat stained and ragged.  The cross guard was a plain flat line and the pommel too was just a cap of steel, scratched and dented.  Adrian ran her thumb over it.  He caught her looking.

"It was my father's," he said, looking at the blade instead of at her.  "I've carried it for as long as I can remember."

She smiled at him.  "It's like you are."

His eyes questioned.

"It's not fancy, its not decorated with anything except scars and old hurts, but its clearly strong and well made even so, to have lasted all this time."  Loghain almost laughed, but it was a bitter sound.  Adrian frowned at him instead.  "It's true," she insisted.  "It might be a bit poetic maybe, but its true."

"I've destroyed everything I've ever touched."  His voice was dark.  Whatever comfort he had, he'd apparently given to Adrian, leaving nothing left for himself.

She wouldn't let him do this to himself.  "Your Ferelden is still standing and in far better shape than Orlais.  It wouldn't be that way, if not for you and if not for the Wardens."

"I know," he admitted.  "But I think that might be despite, not because of my efforts."

Adrian set down the dagger on the table and let his braid fall against his face.  She climbed on to his lap again, like she had the night before, though this time it was just to be close to him, to remind him that he was still here and it wasn't over yet.  She felt like a failure in the dark of the night; she understood how he felt, but she couldn't let him do this to himself.  He deserved better, after everything he'd shown her.  She put her hands under the ridge oh his jaw and made him look at her.

"None of this has gone how either of us planned, I know," she said.  She leaned in and kissed his chin, the corner of his mouth, the ridge of his cheekbone.  "But you helped me realize that I did the best I could.  Someone had to fill the roles we have, someone has to be there to take the blame for the horrible things that need to happen, to make the world change as it needs to."  He closed his eyes and she kissed his eyelids, first the right and then the left, his eyelashes tickling her lips.  "Someone has to be the antagonist of the story.  And it has to be someone strong enough to bear it."

Loghain opened his eyes.  "Perhaps that's so."

"It is so," she said.  "It must be.  The story still goes on, the ending hasn't come yet.  So we both need to be strong to see it through.  You reminded me; now it's my turn to remind you."

She pressed her palm against his cheek for a moment and then picked up the dagger again.  She took his braid and twisted it between her fingers.  With a single, deft movement, she cut through the strands of hair and the braid fell limp into her hand.  She tied the loose end into a knot and coiled the braid in the palm of her hand.

"I'm going to keep this one." she said, closing her hand around it and picked up the second braid.  She cut through that one as well, tying its ends too so the plait wouldn't unravel.  Adrian held it out to him.  "This one," she said.  "Is for her.  I'm sure you can find her, or find someone to take it to her."  She was speaking of Amell, the Hero of Ferelden that he'd told her of.  He didn't speak much of her, but Adrian knew he'd loved her deeply.  He'd loved her enough to let her go, just like all the other beloved people in his life.

She was about to walk way too. 

"I shouldn't," he said, looking at the braid in his hand.  "She thinks I died years ago.  It could only hurt her."

"I don't think so," Adrian said.  "A woman who saves the world isn't likely to fall apart so easily."

Loghain snorted.  "You have a point.  Amell was always made of sterner stuff than I am."

"Women have to be," Adrian said, with a sly smile.  Loghain closed his hand around the braid.  

"I'll take it then, though I can't say what will happen."

"One never can," she said softly.  "There's no way to know what will happen to either of us."  She shook her head at him.  She'd let her insecurities get to her last night; she'd almost given up.  If it hadn't been for Loghain...if it hadn't been for him in so many things, she wasn't sure she'd have the strength to face what was to come.  Whatever happened, the world would change or it would fail.  There was no other way for this to end.  Adrian put her arms around his neck, the braid of his hair still in her hand.  She leaned her forehead against his, listening to the sound of his breath.

"I'm so tired of saying goodbye," Loghain said quietly, his arms coming around her waist.  "I'm just...I'm exhausted and there's so much more to do."

She squeezed him, squeezed her eyes shut.  "I know," she said.  "But maybe this won't be  _goodbye._   We can try to find each other.  No war can last forever."

"It feels like I've always been fighting," he said.  "I can't remember the last time I just laid down my sword and didn't know when I'd pick it up again.  There's always another enemy, another battle."

"Can't set your weapons down, just yet," she said.  "I can't either.  But someday."  She paused and smiled.  It was such a foolish notion, but all they had now was skill and hope.  It was the best they could do.  Why not dream, why not have hope this didn't have to be the end?  "Maybe someday we'll find each other again."

"I'm not one for fantasies," Loghain admitted.  "But I like that idea."

"Let's just," she paused, debating on the right word.  "Let's just dream that it can be.  They taught me at the tower that if your will is strong enough, you can make anything happen in the Fade, even if you aren't a mage.  So maybe if we dream hard enough, it will happen."

Loghain chuckled.  "You didn't seem like such an optimist last night."

"No," she said, pulling closer to him.  "But you bring it out in me.  No one else has ever managed that, not even me."

"I'm honored then, lady," he said.  "That's a service that I'll never be too tired to provide."

 

* * *

 

The sun was high in the sky before they were ready to leave.  It wasn't ideal, but there were plenty of hours to travel and since they were lucky enough to have some sturdy horses, there was no point in waiting.  Adrian almost considered thinking of an excuse to stay one more night, but she knew she'd always want one more.  If she gave in, she'd never leave and there was too much to be done, too far to travel and too much at stake to give in.

Loghain watched as they made the finally preparations.  He was ready to leave already, his saddlebags packed.  He was heading north, towards the Waking Sea.  He was planning on heading to Val Chevin, where he'd heard there were Wardens that were less loyal to Warden-Commander Clarel.  He wouldn't tell Adrian why, and she didn't pry further.  The Wardens held tight to their secrets.  

She was heading east, toward Ferelden and Haven, just outside of the Temple of Sacred Ashes where the conclave was being held.  She'd never been to Ferelden, but she felt like she knew it already, after listening to Loghain's tales and knowing him as she'd come to.  It felt comfortable, knowing she was going to his home, even if he wouldn't be there with her.  Adrian stood next to her gelding, running her finger's through the horse's mane.  It was time to go.  She was stalling.  She turned at the sound of slow click hoofbeats as Loghain led his horse up beside her.  She turned to him, trying to be stoic, but she knew her cheeks were flushed.  

He nodded at her, with a forced half smile.  "Good luck," he said, offering her his hand.  

She took it. "To you as well."

"I will see you again," she said, knowing it was crazy to consider.  "I will."

"I am positive you are stubborn enough to see that through," Loghain said.  There was laughter in his voice, though he sounded sincere.  "I will see you again."

He leaned down to kiss her and she wrapped her free fingers around his arm, holding him in place as she kissed him.  Adrian tried to memorize everything about that kiss, but she knew there was no need.  She couldn't forget him if she tried.  They parted without more words, just one long look before Adrian turned and mounted her horse. She sat up straight in the saddle, her shoulders back.  The wind whipped her hair around her face and she tucked a stray curl behind her ears.  With a deep breath, she turned and looked at him again.

"Not goodbye," she said.  "Until we meet again."

Loghain nodded.  "May the Maker watch over you."

With that, she clicked her tongue at the gelding and he started ahead.  It took only a few steps before she felt herself fall into rhythm with the horse.  The other mages followed behind her, only five on three horses and a single mercenary with a sword and a mare accompanying them.  It wasn't much of a parade.  They'd not make a grand entrance, but it was just as well.  She'd lost her taste for the dramatic since the circles fell.  All she wanted was peace, so she could find Loghain again and have another taste of this freedom.  This was what she wanted all along.  She turned her head back in time to see Loghain turn his horse north and watch his back as he rode away.  He was traveling alone, but she hoped he didn't feel that way.  

Adrian rode east and took him with her in her heart.  She could only hope he'd done the same.


End file.
